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Victor Petkov
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Safety Car plays in Verstappen favor to gift him Las Vegas win
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The Dutch world champion overcame 5-second penalty to get the first victory in Sin City after its return to Formula 1

The 2023 world champion Max Verstappen won the Las Vegas Grand prix after very interesting battles under the lights of the street track.

The Red Bull driver started second behind Charles Leclerc and got the better start, which led to a wheel to wheel battle at turn 1 and Leclerc was pushed off the track, leaving him in second place.

Lando Norris crashed out of the race just seconds later and Safety Car was deployed. The stewards checked the battle between Verstappen and Leclerc and the world champion was handed a 5-second time penalty.

It looked like the Ferrari driver didn’t need this to overtake Max and he did so right before the first stops. Verstappen pitted and got back on track in 11th place, while Leclerc continued and had a solid lead to Sergio Perez. Right after Charles’s first and only stop of the night Verstappen and Russell collided and a second Safety Car got out on track, which helped Perez and Max put new tires, while Leclerc decided to stay on first, but with older rubber.

This was obviously the wrong decision as first Perez and then Verstappen got past the Monaco driver, but right at the end Leclerc fought until the final moment for the second place with Checo and at the final corners he used the DRS and got the 18 points.