Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton frustrated by ‘extreme' Spa rain call

Telegraph

2 days ago

On Thursday evening in the Ardennes hundreds of team members from various series, drivers, journalists and assorted others gathered on the track at Spa-Francorchamps to 'Run for Anthoine'.
The annual event is organised by the Alpine driver Pierre Gasly in memory of his close friend Anthoine Hubert, who died in 2019, at the age of just 22, after a multi-car collision in a wet feature Formula 2 race at Spa.
Hubert is far from the only driver to lose his life at the notoriously fast circuit, which is frequently subject to torrential rain. Just four years after his death, Dutch teenager Dilano van 't Hoff was also killed in similar wet conditions.
In total there have been 53 fatalities, including the deaths of four marshals, since Spa's opening in 1924.
All of which goes a long way to explaining why race control erred on the side of caution when weighing up when to pull the trigger on Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix, which was immediately preceded by torrential rain.
To call that caution excessive, however, would be an understatement. For the thousands of bedraggled fans watching from the grandstands, most of whom camp close by in the days leading up to the race, the delay was hugely frustrating. Earlier, they had watched a very entertaining F2 race in similarly damp conditions. Everyone was excited by the prospect of witnessing the world's best drivers try to negotiate the treacherous Spa circuit in the wet.
Millions more watching on television probably gave up and went and did something else.
The Fagnes chicane proved to be a challenge in our Feature Race at Spa! 👀 #F2 #BelgianGP pic.twitter.com/EAJgo4ZD0q
— Formula 2 (@Formula2) July 27, 2025
It was not a bad call. In the end, what we got was a pretty dull affair. By the time the race finally got under way, behind a safety car, 1hr 20min after the official start time, the track was rapidly drying. Race control still left the safety car out for four laps to clear more of the standing water, with the result that there was a dry line already visible. Race-winner Oscar Piastri needed just four race laps to consider switching to dry tyres and within eight laps of actual racing all the drivers were on slicks, and from then on it was processional.
What did the drivers think?
Both Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton, who have 11 F1 world titles between them, were firmly of the opinion that the race could have started on time at 3pm. 'It was not even raining by then,' Verstappen pointed out. 'OK there was quite a bit of [standing] water between Turns 1 and 5, but two laps behind the safety car then it would have been a lot more clear. So it's a bit of a shame.
'We [Red Bull] made a choice with the set-up for wet weather and then they only allowed us to drive in almost slick conditions! We spoke after [the recent wet-weather race at] Silverstone to be a little bit cautious with the decisions but this was at the other extreme for me.'
Hamilton agreed the race could have started on time, although he did say the drivers had to take some of the responsibility following those post-Silverstone chats. Race control was listening to the drivers' feedback as they lapped behind the safety car and nearly all of them, especially those at the back, were complaining it was unsafe.
'Lots of drivers in the last race said we shouldn't have restarted, because of a lack of visibility. So as soon as someone said 'visibility is pretty bad'...it wasn't great but it wasn't as bad as the last race… I think they just waited.
'They still did a good job. Of course we did miss some of the extreme wet-weather racing, which would have been nice.'
Fans short-changed
No one is saying it is an easy call. Spa is a notoriously dangerous circuit, with an extremely dangerous section between T1 (La Source) and T7 (Les Combes). The drivers go through a compression at Eau Rouge and then up a steep incline on the other side, exiting onto a blind crest onto the Kemmel Straight. Although changes were made following Hubert's death, and there is now more run-off on the left-hand side of Eau Rouge and Raidillon in particular, with the barriers moved back quite significantly, it is still possible for cars to go off, hit the barrier and bounce back onto the racing line.
George Russell was probably in the majority of drivers who felt race control got it right. The Mercedes driver, who is a director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, said it would have been 'stupidity' to begin the race any earlier.
'As a racer, you always want to get going, you love driving in the rain, but the fact is, when you're doing over 200 miles an hour out of Eau Rouge, you literally can't see anything,' Russell said. 'You may as well have a blindfold on. It isn't racing, it's just stupidity.
'So I think, considering it was clearly going to be dry from four o'clock onwards, I think they made the right call.'
But an element of danger and risk is also part and parcel of Formula One. Fans were denied what could have been an exciting race on Sunday. If the Spa circuit needs further modifications to make it safer, fine, but they surely ought to be able to race in the wet. Ex-driver Karun Chandhok spoke for millions when he posted on social media a few minutes before the restart: 'Have we just given up on having wet races anymore? They're going to be on slicks in a few minutes!' He was absolutely right.