Verstappen beats Hamilton again to extend F1 lead

DPA Spielberg (Austria) Max Verstappen beat Lewis Hamilton from pole position at the Styrian Grand Prix to further increase his Formula One championship le...

DPASpielberg (Austria)Max Verstappen beat Lewis Hamilton from pole position at the Styrian Grand Prix to further increase his Formula One championship lead over the seven-time champion on Sunday.Verstappen recorded his fourth win from eight season races, the 14th of his career and third on the Spielberg track in the Austrian home of his Red Bull team.Hamilton was never able to seriously threaten Verstappen because his Mercedes lacked the pace of the Red Bulls on the straights and he had to settle for second ahead of team-mate Valtteri Bottas.Title holder Hamilton and Mercedes are now four races without victory, all won by Red Bull with three of them from Verstappen.Verstappen extended his lead atop the championship to 18 points with his second win in eight days, having beaten Hamilton as well in France on June 20.He can make it three within 15 days on the Spielberg track which also hosts the Austrian Grand Prix on July 4. In that case he could potentially move a race win (25 points) ahead of the Briton.“It’s looking really good,” Verstappen said. “We just have to keep pushing really hard and I’m confident we can do a really good job again.“We have to show it again next week. We’ll look at what we can do better and I’m looking forward to next week.” Hamilton said: “I was trying to keep up but the speed they have, they’ve obviously made some big improvements over the last couple of races and it’s impossible to keep up.“We need an upgrade of some sort. We need to find some performance from somewhere.” Verstappen laid the foundations by handily winning the start from pole while Hamilton needed to fend off early pressure from McLaren’s Lando Norris and Sergio Perez in the second Red Bull.Pierre Gasly’s race was meanwhile over after his Alpha Tauri was hit by Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari, with Leclerc needing to pit over front wing damage and Gasly having to retire with too much damage after a rear puncture.Norris then started to struggle with Perez and Bottas passing him while up front Hamilton almost lost his car in lap 25 to fall five seconds behind Verstappen.Perez lost third place to Bottas during the only round of pit stops, after the Finn started fifth after coming second in qualifying, owing to a grid penalty over spinning in the pit lane in practice.Verstappen retained a comfortable lead through the stops en route to coasting home.Hamilton pitted once more at the end to snatch the extra point for fastest lap on fresh rubber but insisted that “we need to find some performance” in the title fight.“We have to fight back with all we have,” Mercedes motorsport chief Toto Wolff told Sky TV. “We were never close enough to Max.” Perez finished fourth ahead of Norris and the Ferrari duo of Carlos Saniz and Leclerc while George Russell meanwhile had to retire his Williams with a power unit problem after bravely qualifying in 11th and also enjoying a promising start into the race.