Akunob

Great race and fantastic win for Shar. Very fitting win for Shar given the circumstances and the passing of his friend Hubert. A sad weekend for racing. Ferrari played it great and had Vettel running interference and holding up Lewis for a while which I think made the difference. Lewis was close but Shar drove very well to hold on for the victory. Interesting point about the rebuilt car for Lewis but I don’t think it was much of a factor, as he had great pace in the race. Excellent drive by Albon, disappointing drive for Ricciardo and Max is back to his old ways! Let’s see whether Ferrari can build on this for Monza...

MarcD147

BS
racing incident... he got alongside, Kimi didn't see him and went for apex.

Max/rbr needs to work on getting off the line at the start

Thundermoose

Agreed... all set up by very poor start

StoogeMoe

Yep. Max didn't do himself any favors by having a tardy start. Surprised Kimi dove for the apex knowing that someone always tries that move.

Great win for LeClerc! He definitely earned that one. I was surprised by the Mercedes' strong race pace. Ferraris look good for Monza, but this is no slam dunk. They will have to be on the top of their game to send the tofosi into bedlam.

Poor Lando. He had a solid 5th going all day. Then to die with one lap to go. Argh.

Agree. Albon did a good job with his his first race with the main team. He kind of lucked out with Lando going out, but hung in there after a bad first stint.

Manifold

Somber race atmosphere for the drivers, teams, and us spectators alike … upside is that fatalities in FIA racing have become relatively rare (and therefore shocking), but downside is that we saw that they can still occur and there's a limit to how much safety can be provided by safety systems, especially for crashes involving more than one car. Sobering reminder of the risks we face in the amateur/club and DE environment.

Agreed that it was a racing incident, but Max had the better vantage point and should have backed out. He went backwards again at the start, and seems like he was a bit desperate to make up places ASAP, so as not to disappoint the Dutch funs - which he certainly wound up doing.

Glad for Charles.

Let's face it, Valteri just isn't as good a driver as Lewis overall. And maybe Seb isn't as good as Charles overall either.

Akunob

Watch it again, Max dived bombed on the inside where there was clearly no room as Kimi was well ahead of him and closing the window. Max was overly aggressive and it cost him. Again, mature Max 2.0 would have realized that he has more pace than the Alfa Romeo and would most likely pass him 3-4 turns later and back-off. But Nooooo Max reverted to Max 1.0 and went for it...end of GP for him!

Nizer

Big Vettel fan but he's a family man now and that much needed edge appears to be in the rear view mirror.

Mad Max!

9.5 Degrees

Great win for both Ferrari and LeClerc as it appears they needed this badly if nothing else but to not not lose moral. Another entertaining race up and down the grid.

I think it was a race incident between Kimi and Max. If more blame would need to be placed, it would be on Max as Kimi didn't have any room on the left so he went right. It's unfortunate the Dutch fans didn't see what they came for.

Everyone is giving praise to Albon, but in reality it was bad luck for Norris in an inferior car running safely in 5th all race long and earned the driver of the day.

StoogeMoe

Why is it that every time they mention LeClerc they have to qualify him as a Monegasque driver? It makes me laugh. They don't say Vettel, the Heppenheim driver... or Kimi, the Espoo driver... Is it that special that you come from Monaco? Well it's a special place, but is it significant to the discussion? I don't care if LeClerc came from Brooklyn, I just care that it's him. What am I missing here?

multi21

Mixed emotions. Really happy that we had another entertaining race with action and passing up and down the grid, but sad that the 1st Ferrari win of the year and LeClerc first ever in F1 came on such a somber weekend. I didn't know until the post race interviews that LeClerc and Hubert used to kart against each other! Really sad.

Just some random thoughts: I think LeClerc had rubber in reserve and was managing the gap and making his way through back markers. If Vettel could hold off Hamilton with old tires for 4-5 laps, LeClerc certainly could have with tires that were only 1 lap older than Hamilton's if there were more laps left in the race.

Norris was voted driver of the race for good reason and was unfortunate to stop with just 1 lap to go. Not a good day for McLaren with both cars DNF.

Whether it was Max's fault or not, if you watch the onboard replay, he knew he didn't have any steering after the hit with Kimi but he still accelerated up through Eau Rouge... Why?

Both Renaults really qualified well this weekend showing good pace on this circuit. Riccardo was forced to pit after the 1st lap carnage. Why would Renault have him go the entire race essentially on 1 set of tires and not pit him a 2nd time for softs? The pit lane here at Spa is shorter than other tracks because it's preceeded by a slow chicane, followed by a short straight followed by the slowest corner on the entire track. It makes no sense.

Finally, did anyone watch of post race interviews, specifically the last lap between Perez and Albon? On the broadcast you saw Perez basically push Albon 2 off into the grass on the straight. What they showed on the post race interviews was the fact that Perez was leading Albon as they crossed the start/finish to start the last lap. As they approached the slow 1st corner, Perez pretends he blows the corner and goes way wide. Albon said he knew what Perez was doing (he wanted to have Albon lead down the hill, to Eau Rouge and up the straight so he could get the slip stream and repass with DRS). Albon didn't go for it and slowed way up to the point it looked like they were stopping for the end of the race and everyone is diverted to the pit lane post race... pretty funny mind games going on out there!

Moe: No driver from Monaco has ever won a Grand Prix before today. Don't know if that's a reason, but it does appear Crofty has a man crush on Shar.

MarcD147

Because leclerc is from Monaco just like Vettel is from germany

Monaco is a country just like the USA is a country( albeit very small effectively a city state)

Coochas

Happy to see LEC and Ferrari get the win. VET beautifully played the role that RAI used to play for him. Not so many years ago, VET would have protested as many of the top drivers do.

And what's with these upgraded engine failures for Merc and Ferrari? Is it like a Porsche? You don't drive them for a while and everything dries out and breaks.

gbuff

Star of the show was Maylander sliding that big Benz all over the track--if he brought that thing to a DE I daresay he'd win Amazing testament to the drivers/cars that they think he's too slow!

And the camera shot at the top of Eau Rouge made those cars look like they were shot out of a cannon--fantastic.

Gary
....RIP Hubert.