2021

Copse corner. Silverstone. Lap 1.

Lewis Hamilton turns in. Max Verstappen holds his line. At the apex they touch. The Red Bull’s right-rear tyre is stripped from its rim, and the RB16B slides sideways across the gravel and into the tyre wall at upwards of 290 km/h.[56] The red flag comes out. Verstappen is taken to the circuit medical centre, then to hospital. The impact is measured at 51g.[56]

Round 10 of 22. This is where the title fight stops being a contest and becomes a war.

Red Bull and Honda shook hands in 2018, the partnership confirmed before that season’s French Grand Prix. Red Bull had watched Honda’s engines improve in its sister team, Toro Rosso, and ended its relationship with Renault to get them. The first Honda-powered Red Bulls ran in 2019.[72] Verstappen finished third in the championship in 2019 and again in 2020 under Honda power.[55]

By 2021 the project matures. Max Verstappen is twenty-three years old. He has driven in Formula 1 since 2015, signed at seventeen as the youngest driver in the sport’s history.[55] He is fast in qualifying. He is harder in wheel-to-wheel combat. He does not cede ground without a fight.

The season opens in Bahrain. Verstappen takes pole; Hamilton wins the race. The gap between them at the flag is 0.745 seconds.[75][76] In the races that follow, the advantage moves back and forth. Verstappen wins at Imola, Monaco, in France, then back-to-back at the Red Bull Ring — Styria and Austria. Hamilton answers in Portugal, Spain, Britain, Russia.[74] There are 22 rounds in 2021.[17] Neither man can afford to lose many. Neither man gives ground easily.

Red Bull wins 11 races across the season.[43] Hamilton wins 8.[59] Verstappen wins 10.[59] Every point between them matters.

Verstappen is hospitalised for precautionary checks after the Copse collision. He is released the same night.[56] The stewards deliberate. They rule Hamilton predominantly — but not fully — at fault, and award him a 10-second penalty.[56]

Ten seconds. Served during a pit stop. Hamilton pits from second, takes the penalty, and rejoins fourth. He passes Norris. Bottas is told to let him through. That leaves Charles Leclerc, who has led since the opening-lap chaos. Hamilton catches him on lap 50 and takes the lead, and the win.[56][60]

The stewards’ finding satisfies neither team. Red Bull adviser Helmut Marko accuses Hamilton of dangerous driving and suggests a race ban; Toto Wolff calls it a racing incident.[56] Hamilton celebrates on the podium. Verstappen calls the celebrations “disrespectful and unsportsmanlike”.[56]

This is the tone the year has found.

Round 14. The Italian Grand Prix. Monza.

On lap 26, the two cars arrive at the first chicane side by side — Hamilton emerging from a slow pit stop, Verstappen attacking. Squeezed at the second turn, the Red Bull bounces over a sausage kerb, makes contact with Hamilton’s left-rear tyre, and is launched into the air and over the top of the Mercedes.[57][61]

A wheel lands on the halo protecting Hamilton’s head. Hamilton later says it “saved my neck”.[71] Both drivers are unhurt. Both retire on the spot.[57][61]

The stewards rule Verstappen predominantly at fault and award him a three-place grid penalty for the next race, the Russian Grand Prix.[57] The race itself is won by Daniel Ricciardo for McLaren — the team’s first victory since the 2012 Brazilian Grand Prix, nearly nine years before — with Lando Norris second.[57][61]

Two drivers left the track at Monza. One left because of the other. The season did not slow down.

Round 21. Saudi Arabia. First time on the Formula 1 calendar.[58]

The Jeddah Corniche Circuit is fast and tight — a street circuit with walls close on both sides and limited run-off. It does not reward error. It does not reward hesitation.

The race is stopped twice. Two red flags, a Safety Car, four virtual Safety Car periods.[58] At a restart, Verstappen passes Hamilton off the track — and for leaving the circuit and gaining an advantage, he is handed a 5-second time penalty.[58] The team orders follow: give the position back. Verstappen slows on the run to the DRS detection line. Hamilton, who has not been warned, is caught out as the Red Bull brakes “suddenly and significantly”. The cars touch. Hamilton’s front wing is damaged.[58]

After the race, the stewards add a 10-second penalty for causing the collision. Neither penalty changes Verstappen’s second place.[58] Hamilton wins the race.[62]

After the results are processed, the standings show both men on 369.5 points.[77][17] The 0.5 figures trace to the Belgian Grand Prix at Round 12, where rain allowed only two laps behind the Safety Car before the red flag ended the race — the result was taken from the end of lap one, and half-points were awarded.[73]

Two drivers. Twenty-one races. Equal points.

One race left.

The Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Round 22. Yas Marina Circuit.

Verstappen starts on pole. Hamilton starts second.[21][17] One will win the Drivers’ Championship. The other will not.

Hamilton leads for most of the night. Then, in the closing laps, a late Safety Car bunches the field — and what happens at the restart, on the final lap, is the subject of another article: the one that started this series.[17]

→ Read: Abu Dhabi 2021: The race that changed Formula 1.

Max Verstappen becomes the first Dutch driver to win the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship.[55] He is twenty-four years old.[55] He is also the first Honda-powered champion since Ayrton Senna in 1991.[17]

Mercedes retains the Constructors’ Championship — their eighth consecutive — with 613.5 points to Red Bull’s 585.5.[43]

The hybrid era does not end here. But it changes. Verstappen wins the championship again in 2022, in 2023, in 2024.[72] The dynasty that Mercedes built over eight years did not fall in a single season — but the crack opened at Copse corner on lap 1 of the British Grand Prix, and the sport ran through it.