00:00It's lights out and away we go, pretty even start from the front two, Verstappen does move over to cut off Lewis Hamilton, that gets a roar of approval, it is 1-2-3, Hamilton in second, Verstappen leads Bottas third, and round the first corner we go, the two Ferraris might be swapping places as Carlos Sainz comes under a bit of pressure as well from his teammate Charles Leclerc, round the banking now, and that's the Alpine passer Antonio Giovinazzi and Fernando Alonso, Esteban Ocon has lost places,
00:28but it's a dream start for Max Verstappen as Giovinazzi gets on the grass and has to get his elbows out.
00:33Oh, that was a very simple off the line for the front two, but there's so much action now from turn three, turn four, turn five, and through the sweeping right hander, into turn three, really exciting with the Ferraris down low, trying a different line.
00:46I tell you what, Fernando almost got collected by George Russell before he took that high line as well, we're on board with Antonio Giovinazzi now, who lost places on that opening lap as he sees the Alpine,
00:58coming right into his field, and we had to take a step back from our monitor there, did he touch there?
01:04A little bit, and every lap in practice they've done the high line, and then suddenly in the race they've decided that the low line is the better line.
01:11In comes Lewis Hamilton for his first stop of the race, and I say first stop of the race because I don't expect those medium tyres to go between now and the end of 72 laps.
01:22Max is going to react, that's all he has to do today, just cover Lewis.
01:26I was going to ask the question, do they cover Lewis Hamilton and respond, and that's exactly what Red Bull are doing, and if you think Mercedes' pit box is tight, well it's even tighter for Max Verstappen.
01:36But in he comes, 3.6 seconds Lewis Hamilton was stationary, 2.7 seconds Max Verstappen was stationary.
01:43So this is the race win for Verstappen, or for Hamilton, or is it for Bottas, if he's going longer on a one-stop, do Mercedes think that could be the best way to run this race now?
01:55I'll tell you what, Max Verstappen has caught Valtteri Bottas at a good time here.
02:00He ran wide through the entry to the chicane there, which would have put him on the back foot, and look how close, look how close Max is now.
02:06This is his opportunity.
02:08But look how close Lewis is as well, Valtteri has done a sterling job here to try and hold up Max Verstappen, he's not going to hold him up any longer.
02:15Because with DRS, there he goes, and you can hear the roar from the Dutch Lions in the grandstands,
02:21but you can also see the marbles that are being flicked up into the air when he went offline.
02:26Now, going offline is Valtteri Bottas to let Lewis Hamilton through,
02:30and the upshot of the last five or so laps is a three and a half second advantage for Max Verstappen over Lewis Hamilton,
02:37is now down to just 7 tenths.
02:40Look at the marbles that are being flicked up in Lewis's face from Max in front on the inside line.
02:44Lewis Hamilton let by and passed his teammate a lot easier than Max Verstappen had found it.
02:51I rather get the feeling we had a Vettel spinner.
02:54Oh, he's gone for the inside, lost the rear, but I was able to collect it up.
02:58Oh, that's that Bottas, just missed him.
03:01Well, that's going to take, that's going to take a bit of time off Valtteri Bottas' charge towards Verstappen and Hamilton.
03:09He lost about 1.5 seconds, one and a half seconds in that first sector because he was the car having to take evasive action.
