SUZUKA, Japan — Max Verstappen secured his second consecutive Formula 1 world championship with a victory in Sunday’s rain-soaked Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka Circuitland.
A dramatic late-race penalty assessed to title contender Charles Leclerc sealed the championship for Verstappen.
Verstappen won a restarted race amid persistent rain at Suzuka, with Leclerc initially looking set to finish second. But the Ferrari driver was penalized for cutting the chicane on the final lap as he defended from Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez.
The dramatic points swing means Verstappen heads to the United States Grand Prix, and the final four races of the season, with an unassailable lead over Perez and Leclerc.
“This is crazy! To win here in Japan is really special, I feel really proud that we could do it here,” Verstappen said. “When I crossed the line, I didn’t know that I was world champion, there was a lot of confusion but I thought it was quite funny. The first championship was very emotional and this time it feels very different, it feels even more beautiful because of the season we’ve had.
“The teamwork has been unreal, we kept on pushing, kept on believing and kept on improving the car. As a Team we’ve made very few mistakes, you can’t be perfect but for most of the races we were close to it.”
The race originally got under way, with Verstappen defending from Leclerc after a close run to Turn 1, and only two laps being completed before the action was red-flagged amid intense spray and a series of incidents, which included Carlos Sainz crashing out.
A lengthy delay followed, with the overall three-hour race limit ticking down, and the two-hour window coming into force an hour after the initial start, as race control waited for a suitable gap in the weather to get the action going again.
With just under 50 minutes to run on the race clock, the Safety Car led the field out of the pit lane for a planned rolling start, which was soon carried out and released the pack of cars – all of them this time forced to run wets, rather than having the choice to use intermediates.
From there, Verstappen mastered the switch from wets to intermediates as the track surfaced gradually improved and edged away at the head of the field, eventually crossing the line more than 20 seconds clear.
Leclerc was on course to finish second, and to keep the title race alive, but he was penalized for cutting the final chicane on the final lap to keep a charging Perez at bay, with the points difference meaning Verstappen sealed the crown.
Esteban Ocon took a fine fourth for Alpine after some fierce defending against Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes, with Sebastian Vettel recovering from a clash with Fernando Alonso at the initial start to take sixth.