Lewis Hamilton takes record ninth victory at British GP; Max Verstappen second

Lewis Hamilton won a dramatic British Grand Prix in mixed conditions, ending a victory drought that stretched back to the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

The Mercedes driver defeated his old foe Max Verstappen to the win by 1.4 seconds, and in doing so took his ninth win on home soil at Silverstone — the most for any driver at a single circuit in Formula One history.

An emotional Hamilton stated afterwards: “I can’t stop crying. I know it’s been since 2021, every day getting up trying to put my mind to the task and work as hard as I can with this amazing team, and this is my last race here at the British Grand Prix, so I wanted to win this so much for them.

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He added: “It’s so tough, I think for anyone. I think the important thing is how you continue to get up and continue to dig deep even when you feel like you’re at the bottom of the barrel.

“I mean there have definitely been days between 2021 and here when I didn’t feel like I was good enough or whether I was going to get back to where I am today, but the important thing is I had great people around me continuing to support me, my team, every time I turn up and see them putting in the effort, that really encouraged me to do the same thing.”

Hamilton’s long wait for his 104th F1 victory stretches back to his title battle with Verstappen in 2021.

The seven-time world champion lost out on both the championship and a race win in controversial circumstances at the final race of 2021, with Mercedes then struggling to provide him a winning car under a new set of regulations introduced in 2022.

Hamilton is due to leave Mercedes for Ferrari at the end of the year after 12 years at the team.

Behind Hamilton, Verstappen overtook Lando Norris for second place with four laps left and initially looked like he might catch the Mercedes as well.

For the majority of the 52-lap race, Verstappen looked out of contention for the victory, but his car came alive with a switch to the hard compound tires at his final pit stop.

Norris and Hamilton opted for soft tires, which proved fast initially but soon dropped off in performance, allowing Verstappen to pass the McLaren and close to within 1.4 seconds of the lead at the chequered flag.

Verstappen said: “We just didn’t have the pace today, I was slowly dropping back when it mattered at the beginning.

“It did not look great at some point, I was really thinking: ‘Are we gonna finish fifth, sixth?’ The call from the team to be on the hard tyre at the end instead of the soft was definitely helping me out. That’s why I think we finished second today, it could have been a lot worse, we’re making the right calls and we still got onto the podium and I’m of course happy with that.”

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