With Hamilton currently in ninth at the time, and Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz out of the points, Ferrari knew they’d have to act if they were to clinch second place. According to Horner their plan made sense, but it wasn’t executed correctly.
“It was the logical thing to do,” Horner explained to the media after the race. “From Ferrari’s position, they only did half the job because they let Checo (Perez) through, and as Checo demonstrated in that section of the circuit [Sector 3], you can hold up quite a bit of time there.
“Charles needed to hold George off a little more to get that extra, but we’ve just got a different neighbour [in the pit-lane] next year.” Verstappen had already won the World Championship in record time this season, finishing on 575 points to mark the most dominant F1 campaign in history.
