Verstappen hails "incredible" unexpected Silverstone victory

Max Verstappen admits he didn't see that victory coming at the 70th Anniversary Formula 1 Grand Prix.

Starting fourth behind both Mercedes and Nico Hülkenberg, Verstappen dispatched the Racing Point in the first few corners, allowing for him to pile the pressure onto Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton ahead.

The tyres, Pirelli moving the range one step softer from last weekends British Grand Prix, proved to be the difference.

Mercedes suffered from high levels of degradation in the opening stages but the Red Bull driver, who started on the hard tyre compared to the mediums run by Mercedes, was free of problems and his impressive opening stint ultimately put the Dutchman in position to take the victory.

Verstappen admitted, "I didn't see it coming!

"I didn't really have a lot of tyre issues at all and we just kept pushing. An incredible result, of course, to win here and we just had a great day. Everything worked out well, we had the right strategy. Everything was really smooth. Incredibly happy to win."

During the opening stint of the race, the pit wall instructed Verstappen to hang back from the leaders to protect the tyres.

Objecting to this, he replied: "I'm not going to sit behind like a grandma."

Explaining his comment, he added: "We so far didn't have an opportunity in all of the races to push them.

"I could see we were pushing them. I tried to put the pressure on, they had to pit and from there I could do my own pace and basically build that advantage to the end."

"We do need to use soft tyres, that seems to suit our car but we will see again in Barcelona. I think now we are just very happy that we just won."

Before you go...

Verstappen victorious as Mercedes struggle at Silverstone

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