Peerless Max Verstappen could race away with 2022 F1 title after superb Canada victory

Once a late safety car had drawn them close together around the parkland streets of Montreal, Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz were threatening to produce a thoroughey thrilling end to Sunday’s Formula One Canadian Grand Prix, as two men driving the fastest cars in the field set off on a 15-lap shootout for victory.

Sainz, the Ferrari driver who through a combination of poor fortune and fundamental errors has fallen by the wayside in this season’s title fight already, was clambering all over Verstappen’s gearbox in the final portion of the race as he hunted his first victory in the top tier of motorsport. Separated by less than a second, on fresher tyres, and with the marginally quicker car on the day, the 27-year-old Spaniard seemed destined to pass his former teammate and step onto the top step of the podium for the first time in his eight-season career.

On each tour of the circuit before the chequered flag was waved, Sainz was able to use the assistance of F1’s DRS system to draw himself in towards Verstappen’s rear wing along the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve’s long back straight. With the straight-line speed advantage afforded to him by DRS, making a pass just once in 15 attempts should have been possible.

But at the finish line, it was Red Bull ahead of Ferrari, Verstappen ahead of Sainz, and an increased lead of 46 points at the top of the drivers’ championship for the Dutchman.

In truth, it was hard to ever quite believe that Sainz was truly going to make it past Verstappen. All of the component parts were there – the tyres, the DRS and the number of laps – but Verstappen was in such control of the entire weekend in Canada that the idea of him faltering seemed simply implausible.

Every time Sainz pulled up behind Verstappen or attempted to draw alongside on entry to the final chicane at turn one, Verstappen placed his car immaculately in order to simultaneously block off the possible pass, compromise Sainz’s line into the subsequent pit straight, and ensure himself enough traction to be able to defend again into turn one at the beginning of the following lap.

Both Sainz and Verstappen agreed that the Ferrari had been the faster car on race day in Montreal, and it was Verstappen’s unflappable lead of the race and ability to avoid even the smallest of mistakes which meant there was simply no way through for the valiant Sainz, no matter how much quicker he may have been.

“I was pushing flat out,” Sainz said afterwards in his post-race interview. “I wasn’t leaving any inch against the walls, I was trying everything to pass Max. In the end, I didn’t leave anything on the table out there. I want my first win very much so you can imagine how much I was pushing. I was the fastest guy on track today and I was giving it everything.”

The strength of Sainz’s insistence that he had nothing left to give in the faster of the two cars underlined a simple fact that is dominating Formula One right now – Max Verstappen is driving at a totally different level to anybody else on track.

The 24-year-old’s start to the season was indifferent, blighted by mechanical failures in two of the opening three races in Bahrain and Australia, and he was left lagging behind early leader Charles Leclerc in the second Ferrari. But Red Bull have won the last six rounds of the season, five of them Verstappen victories, and his lead now means he is essentially two race wins ahead of his nearest rival.

In Canada he was utterly imperious. In treacherous conditions in the wet on Saturday he qualified on pole, more than six-tenths-of-a-second ahead of the rest of the field, in a display which underlined his ability to drive even better when things get tough.

With the wily Fernando Alonso starting second on the grid and promising to try to take the lead off the start, Verstappen burst away from the two-time title winner as the lights went out and drove into the distance at the start of the race.

From there he drove quickly and consistently, challenged only when the safety car brought out by Yuki Tsunoda’s inexplicable punt into the barrier after exiting the pitlane gave Sainz a shot at a victory he was otherwise never in contention for, but not for a moment losing an iota of the unerring composure that defines his driving style.

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner believes that the current world champions has never driven better.

“Max is in the form of his life,” Horner beamed after the race. “It’s so easy to lock a wheel into the last hairpin, but Max was absolutely clinical today. A really impressive drive.”

Of course, Red Bull have nailed the transition to Formula One’s new technical era better than any other team. They have built a car that is faster than any other over long distance at most circuits, have managed to avoid the intense porpoising that has blighted teams including Mercedes, and managed strategy calls expertly throughout the campaign.

But, as it was in 2021, Verstappen’s record when he is able to finish races has been sensational. In the seven races in which his car has made it to the end so far in 2022, Verstappen has won six and finished third once. Had it not been for the mechanical failures that cost him at Sakhir and Albert Park, he would have two more second-place finishes to add to that tally, and would be at least 82 points ahead at the top of the standings before the season is even approaching its halfway point.

For all the talk before the start of the season that F1’s shift in car design could bring the field closer together and shake things up at the top, there is a very realistic chance that Verstappen is going to simply drive off into the sunset with the championship trophy in his cockpit over the course of the summer at F1’s traditional European grands prix.

Red Bull’s reliability issues, which cost Verstappen’s teammate and closest rival Sergio Perez a chance of limiting the damage in Canada, could possibly prevent him from doing so. And the misfortune which has befallen Leclerc in recent months could turn and hamper Verstappen at some stage too.

Verstappen’s rivals will have to hook all their hopes on reliability problems or sheer bad luck, then, because here he demonstrated that there is such little weakness in his driving, such little deviation in his confidence, and such little chance of him making an error, that passing him for the title could be as impossible as Sainz found it to be on track in Canada.