Max Verstappen emerged victorious in an action-packed Sprint race at the Austrian Grand Prix, surviving some drama during the early stages of a wet to dry outing to claim an ultimately dominant win on Red Bull’s home soil.

Verstappen lost the lead to team mate Sergio Perez at the start but quickly fought back and settled into a rhythm up front, cruising away from the competition to cross the line comfortably clear of the Mexican and Ferrari rival Carlos Sainz.

Verstappen, Perez, Sainz and a handful of other front-runners stayed on intermediate tyres for the full encounter, holding enough of a margin over a host of drivers who moved to slicks late on but could not make up more than the ground they had lost.

With a revised Sprint format in place in 2023, the new ‘Shootout’ qualifying session set the grid for the 24-lap dash, which offered up the incentive of some extra points – from eight for P1 to one for P8 – for the 20 drivers in action.

As the race start approached, drops of rain began to fall and then intensified, taking the circuit away from slicks and towards intermediates, which were the tyre of choice for all bar a brave Valtteri Bottas (on mediums) by the time the grid was cleared of guests, mechanics and the gazebos that had been pulled into action.

Bottas’ gamble swiftly backfired, with Alfa Romeo calling him into the pits for intermediates ahead of the start, where Perez dramatically got the jump on team mate Verstappen and forced his way past on the inside line into Turn 1 – the duo continuing their exchange at the exit and Verstappen dipping two wheels on the grass.

Verstappen instantly retaliated and attacked Perez under braking for Turn 3, taking both of them wide and almost allowing Nico Hulkenberg through for the lead. With Verstappen back in P1, Perez lamented over the radio: “What’s wrong with Max, man?”

Matters got worse for Perez down at Turn 4, where a pumped up Hulkenberg applied the pressure again and slipped past on the exit, meaning the Haas found himself splitting the two Red Bulls, with Sainz holding fourth from Stroll and Alonso.

Lando Norris was a big loser in the Turn 3 bottleneck, getting caught up behind the squabbling Red Bulls and suffering a slow exit – meaning he fell from fourth all the way down to 10th, slotting behind Alex Albon, Ocon and Leclerc.