Verstappen made a storming start off the line, with the Ferraris behind but Piastri came straight through to third place. Perez cocked it up, going wide, a straight across and then a little off the track and back on and across, holding up Norris but letting everyone else get away ahead of them. Verstappen was out of DRS range of LeClerc by the third lap.
Piastri continued to have a great start to the race, overtaking LeClerc for second place on the fifth lap.
Nothing much happened for many laps, including some pit stops until Verstappen ran wide and knocked down a bollard, depositing it in the middle of the track. Did he do it deliberately to try and get an easier pit stop behind a Safety Car? A Virtual Safety Car was called very briefly for the debris to be cleared away and only a few cars could benefit, none of the leaders.
Verstappen, Piastri and a few others took their stops and then Sargeant does what any second Williams driver does best and brought out a Safety Car in a crash with Magnussen. It may have been Magnussen's fault but it was a close call. Norris, who was in the lead, got the quick pit stop and maintained the lead.
Norris didn't handle the restart well and Verstappen was right on his tail, with LeClerc more than a second behind him to trouble the Red Bull. Ultimately he did keep the lead and pulled out far enough ahead before DRS was enabled. Verstappen started to complain about the steering.
Behind them LeClerc carried on by himself and Piastri and Sainz battled corner after corner. Going off the track, the incident was investigated with no further action. Then Sainz had the final go and got past but with Piastri sustaining damage to his front wing, meaning he needed to box to have it replaced. Sainz then began to feel problems with his car. The stewards duly investigated.
Magnussen was awarded a penalty for his role in the earlier incident and then a further penalty for failing to serve the penalty correctly, then another penalty for, well, who knew by now.
It was another awful race for Williams, with Sargeant out and Albon locking up a few laps before the end and running far off the track and back on to take a comfortable last place.
The Russian bots had clearly got to the vote for Driver of the Day, when Hamilton briefly came in third with 6% of the vote and then Bottas with a hefty share of the vote later. Norris clinched it though.
Norris took a comfortable win in the end with Verstappen and Sainz both pulling along side him on the cool down lap to congratulate him. He radioed in some lovely messages, stopping just short of saying he manifested it.
Alpine scored first points of the season but the feel-good race was all about Norris.
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