Norris passes Antonelli's Mercedes to win F1's final Dutch GP
McLaren’s Lando Norris won the 2026 Dutch Grand Prix after overhauling Mercedes’s Kimi Antonelli, who finished second ahead of team-mate George Russell.
Max Verstappen’s opening lap crash brought out red flags early on as the Dutchman spun and hit the outer barriers of the final corner on a damp surface, ending what could be his final home race prematurely.
The lengthy delays for barrier repairs were extended as Haas’s Ollie Bearman retired with suspected power unit issues on his lap to the grid.
On the race restart, Antonelli passed Norris off the line, but the championship leader was tailed by the reigning champion throughout. Both drivers took their second pitstop on lap 40. On lap 54, Norris passed Antonelli around the outside of Turn 1.
What would have been a simple drive to the flag turned on its head as Haas’s Esteban Ocon stopped at Turn 3, bringing out a virtual safety car on lap 56.
Antonelli took fresh softs during the VSC, along with the Ferraris - leaving Norris in the lead ahead of Russell.
Norris won comfortably - by more than 11 seconds - but Russell finished third, behind Antonelli.
Having stayed out during the VSC, Russell was swapped with Antonelli on lap 65. The Briton protested, asking whether his team-mate was fighting for the win and adding that Mercedes had “lost a double podium”.
Hamilton’s frustration at Ferrari strategy
Russell was vulnerable and perhaps resigned to a late battle with Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton, but he hung on with the help of another late safety car - this one triggered by a collision between the Williams.
Russell finished third by just 0.849s as Hamilton therefore settled for P4 from P6 on the grid.
The seven-time champion extended his stints beyond those of team-mate Charles Leclerc and found himself tailing Leclerc around lap 40. Hamilton requested a position swap and made his frustration clear - complaining that he wasn’t able to put his tyre offset to good use - on the radio.
When Leclerc was finally pulled into the pits on lap 44, Hamilton said: “Great way of wasting time guys, good job".
Oscar Piastri had lost a place to fast-starting Leclerc before the early red flag.
His McLaren was then fitted with hard tyres (while his team-mate Norris was on softs alongside the Ferraris, and the Mercedes were on mediums) for the race restart.
Despite having the tyres to extend his first stint, Piastri was pitted on lap 18 to cover a Russell undercut - which itself was nixed as he emerged in traffic - and the Australian ended up sixth, having been picked off by the Ferraris in the middle of the race.
Liam Lawson finished a lonely seventh in the sole Red Bull - despite taking a 10-second time penalty for a yellow flag infringement late on.
Hulkenberg stars
Nico Hulkenberg drove a highlight reel of a race, dodging his Audi team-mate Gabriel Bortoleto at the end of the opening lap with a stunning show of reflexes.
The veteran driver then won out in a long and scintillating battle against the Racing Bulls, Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, and Williams’s Carlos Sainz around lap 25 - which involved overtakes throughout this notoriously difficult circuit.
Fernando Alonso took P9 for Aston Martin, taking just one pitstop on lap 34 as he ran a soft-soft-hard strategy to beat Alpine's Pierre Gasly.
Racing Bulls stand-in Yuki Tsunoda fell 4.6s short of scoring a point on his F1 return, while team-mate Arvid Lindblad took a drive-through penalty for a yellow-flag infringement at the start of the race and finished 12th, ahead of Bortoleto - who endured a glacial start and then spun - in P13.
Alpine’s Franco Colapinto was 14th having also received a drive-through penalty at the start.
Sergio Perez finished 15th from the pitlane for Cadillacs ahead of the Williams drivers.
Sainz took 16th after an intra-team collision with Alex Albon, who was classified 17th.
Valtteri Bottas and Lance Stroll joined the retirees with separate troubles late in the race as Cadillac and Aston Martin continue to diagnose their respective reliability issues.
Dutch GP results
- Lando Norris (McLaren)
- Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) +11.5s
- George Russell (Mercedes) +15.9s
- Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) +16.7s
- Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) +17.2s
- Oscar Piastri (McLaren) +32.3s
- Liam Lawson (Red Bull) +79.9s
- Nico Hulkenberg (Audi) +1 lap
- Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) +1 lap
- Pierre Gasly (Alpine) +1 lap
- Yuki Tsunoda (Racing Bulls) +1 lap
- Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls) +1 lap
- Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi) +1 lap
- Franco Colapinto (Alpine) +2 laps
- Sergio Perez (Cadillac) +2 laps
- Carlos Sainz (Williams) +2 laps
- Alex Albon (Williams) +6 laps
DNF: Valtteri Bottas (Cadillac), Esteban Ocon (Haas), Lance Stroll (Aston Martin), Ollie Bearman (Haas) and Max Verstappen (Red Bull)