In the opening phase of the race, it was Verstappen who had the edge as, after holding the advantage at the start, he was steadily able to eke out a gap on the medium tyres to be more than six seconds clear up until the first round of stops.
Things did not seem to change much as drivers switched to the hard, as Norris, who briefly lost a bit of time getting past Red Bull’s Sergio Perez, did not seem any better off.
