Red Bull collect points from Miami Grand Prix sprint

Red Bull collected points from the sprint race at the Miami Grand Prix, with Max Verstappen finishing 5th in the mini-race.

The Milton Keynes-based team picked up a modest reward from the 19 lap race as part of the Miami weekend. Verstappen initially finished 6th on the road before being re-classified 5th after the Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli was given a time penalty after the race.

Teammate Isack Hadjar would ultimately finish 9th, missing out on a point by one place.

Verstappen picked up 4 points for his ultimate 5th place finish, moving up to 16 points so far this season. The Dutchman sits 9th in the championship, level with his former teammate Pierre Gasly. Hadjar, meanwhile, sits 12th with 4 points from the opening phase of the campaign.

After an extended break due to the cancellation of rounds in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, F1 returned into action for the Miami Grand Prix weekend, with Red Bull one of multiple teams hoping upgrades would unlock performance relative to strong early starters Mercedes.

Verstappen started the sprint in 5th, but a slow start saw him get bypassed by the Mercedes of George Russell and engage in a frantic opening skirmish with Ferrari star Lewis Hamilton. However, Verstappen ultimately had to yield to the Ferrari and slid back to 7th.

It was a similar story on lap 1 for Hadjar, who dropped 2 places from 9th on the grid to fall behind Gasly and Gabriel Bortoleto.

As the race progressed, Verstappen gained on Hamilton and ultimately got past on lap 9. In doing so, however, the Dutchman exceeded track limits and had to give his 2021 title nemesis the place back. Before long, however, Verstappen was able to make the move cleanly and retake the position from Hamilton.

In the end, Verstappen couldn’t pass Russell on track to return to 5th, meaning he was initially classed 6th until Antonelli was handed a post-race time penalty for track limit violations, and the Dutchman was duly reclassified 5th regardless.

Hadjar would make moves to get past Bortoleto and the Alpine of Franco Colapinto, making an unconventional move to get the latter, but he ran out of time to get Gasly for the final point in the sprint race.

Saturday night’s qualifying session means Verstappen will start second for the full distance Miami Grand Prix later today (03/05), which will now be starting 3 hours early due to a thunderstorm risk. Hadjar initially qualified 9th, but is at risk of disqualification after his car failed a mandatory post-race check.