RACE REPORT | F1 Miami 2023

Max Verstappen secured victory in the Miami Grand Prix, the fifth round of the 2023 Formula 1 World Championship, held at Miami International Raceway.

Verstappen's teammate Sergio Perez started from pole position and led the race on medium tyres, while Verstappen started from ninth on hard tyres after struggling in qualifying. At the start of the race, Perez maintained his lead over Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz. Pierre Gasly and George Russell were also in contention, but Lando Norris was hit from behind by Nyck de Vries at Turn 1 and both drivers dropped to the back of the pack.

Verstappen managed to move up to sixth place, passing both Leclerc and Magnussen on lap four, while Charles Leclerc also passed Magnussen at turn eleven to move up to sixth. Perez maintained his lead with Alonso second and Sainz third. Verstappen continued his progress through the field, passing Russell and Gasly on lap nine to take fourth.

On lap 15, Verstappen passed Sainz and Alonso to take a 1-2 lead for Red Bull, with Perez still leading. Sainz pitted on lap 19, but a braking error put him back into heavy traffic. He had to fight his way past Lewis Hamilton and Nico Hulkenberg, but received a five-second penalty for speeding in the pit lane.

Perez pitted first of the Red Bull drivers on lap 21 and his quick pit stop of 2.2 seconds allowed Verstappen to take the lead. Alonso pitted on lap 25 after a longer stint on medium tyres and rejoined the race behind Sainz, but ahead of him after his penalty was taken into account. Alonso passed Sainz at Turn 11 and a few laps later moved ahead of Esteban Ocon to regain third place.

Despite having much older tyres than Perez, Verstappen proved quicker and pitted on lap 46. However, his pit stop was relatively slow, lasting 3.1 seconds, and he returned to the race behind his teammate on fresh media. Perez, on the other hand, was running on hard tyres, on which he had already completed 25 laps. Although he tried his best to defend, Verstappen managed to pass him with 10 laps to go at Turn 1 and rode to victory by more than 5 seconds.

Alonso finished third, followed by Russell and Sainz. In the closing stages of the race, Hamilton made an impressive comeback to secure sixth place after passing Leclerc and Gasly. Ocon and Magnussen rounded out the top ten and scored points.