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After it looked like the 2022 F1 season would be between Verstappen and Leclerc, the Dutchman has gone on to utterly dominate F1 in 2022
The 2021 Formula 1 world championship fight was a bitter, heavyweight duel between Max Verstappen and Red Bull against Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes, that went down to the final lap of the race and saw Verstappen take his first world title amid the controversy of how the FIA restarted that race. Now, Verstappen is a two-time F1 world champion, as he has just wrapped up his second world title at the Japanese Grand Prix, again amid some confusion as with the shortened race and new points system for such events, he and his team thought he’d have to wait until USA!
While the FIA have hardly covered themselves in glory in 2022, Verstappen on the other hand has. After it looked like it would be nip and tuck between him and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc early in the season, Red Bull got their car dialed in and the RB18 became the best racing machine on the 2022 grid, while reliability issues, driver and team errors and higher tire wear stifled the Ferrari challenge. Verstappen really was a class above the rest in 2022, and with 12 wins from 18 races so far, he hasn’t finished yet.
The early part of the season unfolded in rather spectacular fashion. It was clear after testing that Ferrari and Red Bull had the best cars, and this was evident at the first race in Bahrain as Leclerc took pole and Verstappen joined him on the front row. Verstappen and teammate Sergio Perez would retire from that race with mechanical issues, after Verstappen had a great battle with Leclerc, but that put Verstappen on the back foot instantly to Leclerc.
The Dutchman struck back after at thrilling and tactical race in Jeddah, but he again suffered a DNF in Australia, a race he’d have finished second in behind a dominant Leclerc. This meant the Ferrari driver now had a 43 point lead in the championship with Verstappen down in sixth in the standings, and Ferrari miles ahead in the constructors standings. Verstappen wasn’t thinking about the championship, just race wins, but he struck back over the next few races, taking maximum points at Imola while Leclerc spun out from third in that race and finished down in sixth place.
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Verstappen would win the next three races in a row, finish ahead of Leclerc in Monaco and then win in Canada and Baku too. After the Spanish Grand Prix, Verstappen took the championship lead, as Leclerc suffered an engine failure and the Ferrari driver suffered another in Baku, and Verstappen opened up a huge lead after the Canadian Grand Prix, a race Leclerc started from the back of the grid in. Silverstone was the only blot on the Verstappen copybook at this point, as he only finished seventh after picking up a piece of Alpha Tauri in the floor of his RB18.
Leclerc hit back with a win in Austria, but at the next race in France the fight was effectively over, as Leclerc crashed out from the lead, and it allowed Verstappen top open up a lead of over 60 points. From this moment on, Verstappen was untouchable. And it didn’t seem to matter where he started as he would always win the race. He qualified 10th in Hungary after an engine issue, but somehow came through to win, despite spinning after passing Leclerc. Engine penalties put him 14th on the grid in Spa, but by lap 12 he was up front and utterly crushed Perez and Carlos Sainz who started at the front.
He again won in Zandvoort after a thrilling race before he dominated in Italy from seventh on the grid after an engine penalty. Singapore saw him manage just seventh after a tricky race, which was the result of a lack of fuel in his Red Bull during qualifying. Had he qualified where he should have, he’d have been on pole by over a second and likely won there as well. He then utterly crushed his rivals in the shortened Japanese Grand Prix, pulling out 26 seconds in just 28 laps. This race highlighted just how good Verstappen has been in 2022.
That has really been the story of the season. Ferrari floundered with poor tactical choices, terrible reliability and the odd driver error. Verstappen meanwhile has racked up win after win despite his two DNFs at the start of the year, and has only really put one foot wrong with his race in Singapore. Even that couldn’t stop him winning the title with four races to spare. Verstappen has just been utterly relentless, not buckled under pressure like Leclerc did in France and crushing his main title rivals.
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Even without Ferrari’s engine failures early in the season and Leclerc’s crash in France, it felt like this was inevitable. Once Verstappen finally dialed himself into the RB18 he didn’t look back, winning from the lower half of the grid and making his rivals look silly at times. Leclerc definitely ran Verstappen close, and was the only other driver who had a realistic shot at the title early in the season. But once Verstappen and Red Bull got into their groove, they never looked back.
Sources: Red Bull, Formula 1, Ferrari
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