You could look up at the screens at any point in Sunday’s Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix and find yourself unable to escape the sheer brilliance of Max Verstappen.
You were riveted to the outside of the first corner, when he braked so late he was nearly in the 22nd Century.
You could not take your eyes off when he pressed home this decisive advantage from second on the grid by wriggling in front at Tamburello moments later.
Thus, he turned pole-sitter Oscar Piastri into pole-axed. The Australian had braked fractionally less early than Verstappen had late, and paid the price.
You marvelled at how Verstappen opened up a one-second advantage over Piastri inwhat remained of the 3.05miles of the first lap. And the 1.4sec he had established by the end of his next navigation of Imola.
He simply tore into a lead he would not have surrendered as long as there was a sun in the sky. So Lando Norris was condemned to finish second and Piastri third.
Max Verstappen won the Imola Grand Prix on Sunday with a hugely impressive performance
He overtook Oscar Piastri on the first corner and never looked like giving up his lead
Lewis Hamilton struggled in qualifying but was able to move through the field into fourth
That was after you rubbed your eyes to believe how Verstappen kept up the pace on aging tyres in his first stint, maintaining an advantage wide enough to emerge from his eventual stop still in front. All this against McLarens so fast that on the grid Zak Brown confided how, given a regulation start, Piastri should comfortably win his fourth race in succession.
Or you could, at a random moment, look at Verstappen’s margin over the other Red Bull, driven by Yuki Tsunoda. After 34 laps, the Japanese driver was lying 12th, 70.4sec behind the relentless Dutchman.
Yes, there have been times these last few years when his dominance harnessed to a Red Bull of his dreams has been a dead weight on the competitiveness of the fare.
That was not the case last year when Norris wasted his superior tools. And certainly not this year, when he has kept his toe in the championship door, only his bruised nail acting as a defiant wedge. He is now 22 points off Piastri and nine behind Norris with 18 races of the marathon remaining.
Victory in Japan last month was a sign of this. His go-to gung-ho defence and attack has mostly served him well all through the early part of the season. In Miami, a fortnight ago, his belligerence was evident again – though it was not repaid with a win. This time, he got his reward.
Motor racing has witnessed some greats. A reminder here is Via Nuvorali, homage to the pre-War buccaneer whom Murray Walker rated the greatest ever. But, then again, Murray did not live long enough to see Verstappen in his pomp.
We did yesterday in his collection of a fourth victory in the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix – a quadruple, like his world titles, accumulated in succession.
A first safety car was not unhelpful to Verstappen when Haas’ Esteban Ocon conked out. A second one, brought about by Kimi Antonelli’s Mercedes giving up the ghost, was less timely. It meant the Piastri and Norris were on his tail when racing resumed after seven laps of concertinaing.
No problem for Max. He was off like a getaway car.
McLaren have dominated in recent races, but Verstappen took top spot on the podium this time
Yuki Tsunoda was no match for his Red Bull team-mate, with Verstappen in a league of his own
McLaren helped him here, though it surely made no difference. But from their perspective, they should have swapped Norris, running third, with Piastri, running second. The Briton was shod on newer tyres and if any mortal was going to pressurise Verstappen, with nine laps remaining, it was the one wearing fresh boots.
In the end, after four laps of following Piastri, Norris passed his team-mate in close combat, breaths held on the pit wall. But b now Verstappen was a speck up the road. So it finished, with Verstappen weaving over the line to claim his 65th victory in Red Bull’s 400th race, by six seconds. Piastri was a further six distant.
Credit to Red Bull for the aero upgrade package they brought to Italy. It is a special team. You don’t win multiple championships in two separate phases, eight years apart, without being.
While acknowledging their collective strength and resilience, one extra stat to register Verstappen’s personal glory is the fact Tsunoda finished 10th, 24sec adrift.
Elsewhere, it was decent result, if a fortuitous one, for Lewis Hamilton – a fourth-place finish. The Tifosi here, only an hour (and a traffic jam) away from the Scuderia’s factory in Maranello, waved their flags and hollered their delight at this turn of events.
It was light relief for them after the horror of the day before when the team registered their worst qualifying performance at Imola in all 32 stagings of this race. Hamilton was only 12th fastest on Saturday and Charles Leclerc 11th.
Charles Leclerc finished behind his team-mate Hamilton, which has been a rarity this season
Hamilton dropped a place at the start and struggled to pass Kimi Antonelli’s Mercedes for an eternity. The safety cars gave him a leg-up the placings, while he made a couple of neat passes when his tyres were helpful.
Alex Albon finished fifth for Williams, a place ahead of Leclerc, who was torpedoed by the first safety car. There is plenty still to remedy at Ferrari, make no mistake. ‘That’s better guys,’ declared a buoyed Hamilton. ‘Let’s keep pushing. Let’s keep it up.’
All round, a disappointing day for Mercedes. George Russell started third – completing a starting trio at the front of the grid who could claim to be the season’s star performers overall.
But he lost a place to the irresistible pace of Norris’s papaya machine early on and, like Leclerc, was kiboshed by the Ocon-triggered pause. He finished seventh.
