It had rained during the day and the track was wet, the rubber had been washed away and there was no sun to dry up all the rain (poor Incy Wincy). Then, more rain! Then it was drying out. Lots of stars were out on the grid as well as in the sky for this race. Lewis Capaldi very much looked like a Scot struggling in foreign heat.
Also looking to the stars were McLaren, wishing on one to seal the Constructor's Championship on their second attempt this year. The top four on the grid had not won this race before.; it was anyone's at this point. Russell was able to hold his lead over Verstappen, which looked unlikely because of the Red Bull's choice of soft tyres. Norris made up two places to get past his team mate for third but did make contact with someone, turned out it was Piastri. Sparks were flying as they got underway and several drivers had made up places with Antonelli falling back.
Piastri was on the radio asking about the contact and calling into question the Papaya Rules. He got grumpier and angrier with each interaction.
Suddenly, Bortoleto was in the pits for a new front wing, his was heavily broken; we had a mystery Yellow Flag earlier, perhaps this was it? At the same time, Norris hit the wall but it looked okay.
A third of the way through, Tsunoda was running in 19th for no apparent reason. And McLaren did a full dummy stop for Norris to try and trick Red Bull into stopping Verstappen. Two laps later, stops started happening and Verstappen was in first but it was a slowish one.
Finally, most of the pitstops were done bar a few long runners and Piastri. There had been no Safety Cars yet. It was a very long one, five seconds for Piastri, so it was a good call from Norris who, when invited, chose not to go in second. McLaren really need to practice doing two good stops in a row. Aston Martin also had a really slow one with Alonso, who had been running really well. When given a call about how many laps were left, the spirit of Raikonnen appeared in his old Ferrari teammate, as he said that if his engineer was going to speak to him every lap he would disconnect the radio.
Gasly gave the wall it's biggest bump so far on lap 34. Verstappen was really struggling, genuinely asking for help on the radio and locking up his tyres. Hulkenberg slid into a spin on lap 45 (of 62), sending out a lot of smoke from his tyres but not causing a Safety Car.
We barely saw Russell all race and then we got a glimpse of him for his celebratory radio call as he won the thing. It wasn't dwelt on for long because we had to cut to the McLaren drivers being thanked for playing their part in securing the Constructor's Championship. Piastri insisted in the press pen that he would not comment on the incident with Norris until he had seen the footage, he was surprisingly unmoody and unupset.
The drivers were sat on the floor, trying to recover, smiling but sweaty and exhausted. The three of them looked very unwell, not fit to be interviewed. There was no Safety Car for two years running to give them a breather.
All around, the drivers were sporting shiny, glittery, sparkly helmets. which twinkled under the lights. Most importantly the sticker of Sparkles sent Sainz from 19th on the grid to a 10th place points finish.
Behind Russell, Verstappen seemed happy to take second and Norris had worked hard for third. Then came Piastri, Antonelli, LeClerc, Hamilton (who nearly lost the place), Alonso and Bearman (who had a strong race).
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