George Russell (P4, 12 pts): 8/10
George Russell was fourth fastest in first practice, but by the end of Friday there were worried looks and furrowed brows in the Mercedes garage as the W13 struggled to deliver in the cool and damp conditions. But that was nothing compared to the doom and gloom of Saturday where Russell, Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff didn't hold back in their apocalyptic assessment of where the team was after ending up two seconds off the time set by Max Verstappen. Even on a circuit the length of Spa, that's well down on where they hoped to be at this stage of the season. When it came to the race, Russell kept his head and followed Hamilton and Fernando Alonso past a slow-starting Sergio Perez; Hamilton and Alonso made contact at Les Combes, allowing Perez to recover his second place with Russell slotting in to third ahead of Alonso, while Hamilton parked his broken car by the side of the track. There was nothing that Russell could do about Verstappen blasting his way past on lap 7, but the Briton did manage to thwart Charles Leclerc from doing the same and for the first time this weekend it looked like the Mercedes actually had the pace to match most if not quite all of its rivals (Max being the obvious exception). Delaying his last strop until lap 29 gave Russell fresher tyres to attack Carlos Sainz for the final podium spot, but it was not to be. "I thought, here we go, we're in for a really good shot here but then I just had two really scrappy laps and got the tyres out of the window," he lamented afterwards.
Carlos Sainz (Pole, P3, 15 pts): 8.5/10
Knowing that his Ferrari team mate Charles Leclerc and Red Bull rival Max Verstappen would both be compromised by big grid penalties for power unit changes this weekend, Carlos Sainz scented his best chance of picking up another race win since his first at Silverstone, and duly opened his account by setting the fastest time of FP1 by 0.069s from Leclerc. But by the second practice session the tide had already turned against Ferrari and Sainz was now a second slower than Verstappen, and then 0.777s behind Perez in final practice on Saturday. His chances of inheriting pole looked increasingly slender, especially after his final Q3 lap proved scrappy, but fortunately Perez hadn't been able to do any better. It was Sainz who took the top spot for the race, and with Perez struggling to launch he was easily able to hold the lead when the lights went out. He had problems of his own at the restart following the safety car but got away with a fumble at the bus stop to stay in front. However by now Verstappen was tearing through the field (sayings about hot knives and butter come to mind); Sainz tried an early stop on lap 11 to exchange his rapidly degrading soft tyres for new set of mediums, but by now it was clear to everyone watching that the Red Bull was simply mighty. Verstappen went by in turn 5 on lap 18, and Perez lined up and pulled off the same move moments later. After that Sainz' main concern was managing a late surge from George Russell, but he preserved his final set of tyres to stay comfortably ahead at the finish line and join the two Red Bull drivers on the podium.
