PALMER: I can’t overstate how difficult Interlagos is to drive in the rain – Verstappen’s epic win was his best wet race yet

Interlagos has seen plenty of dramatic title deciders in the past, and this year’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix will surely prove to be the definitive day of this 2024 season as well, even if Max Verstappen can’t be officially crowned just yet. His performance on Sunday was simply spectacular, and worthy of sealing any title.

It’s a sign of how brilliant the Red Bull and Verstappen partnership is, that even though he lined up way down in P17 on the grid and Lando Norris lined up on pole, you just never could rule Max out of doing something exceptional in mixed conditions. He’s a driver that has had so many epic performances in the wet, but this may well go down as his best race yet.

READ MORE: Verstappen wins chaotic Sao Paulo Grand Prix after stunning recovery from P17 as Alpine score shock double podium

The amazing thing about Max’s drive is that he made it look effortless. There were so many things that could go wrong in a race like this, yet under the greatest title tension he has faced this season, he delivered a Grand Prix of perfection.

Race starts in the wet are incredibly tricky. The key to getting off the line is to minimise wheel spin, but it’s so hard to actually do that when you have almost 1,000 horse power at your disposal and a very slippery surface.

Getting the throttle pedal squeezed down, without spiking the rear wheel spin is the challenge and it’s the first part that Max nailed on Sunday, jumping past a handful of cars once he’d cleverly positioned his Red Bull around the outside of the Senna S.

I raced in the sodden 2016 race at Interlagos and I can’t overstate how difficult this circuit is to drive in these conditions. It’s undulating nature means you get rivers forming, most notably on the exit of Turns 3 and 12, where most of the incidents were.

It’s also tough to get your braking right for the big stops at Turns 1 and 4. Probably the biggest challenge of all though is driving with no visibility as you build the speed up, before being blindfolded by a curtain of spray on a curved straight at high speed.

WATCH: Max Verstappen's mesmerising drive in the wet at Interlagos in 2016

Max dealt with all of that superbly on his famous recovery charge in 2016, but the way he handled the conditions this year I thought was even more clinical.

He made overtaking look like a doddle as he scythed his way into the top six positions with minimal effort. Overtaking in these conditions was actually incredibly hard, as proven by the fact that almost nobody else made an overtaking move in the entire rest of the race. DRS wasn’t activated at all and finding traction off the final corner at Turn 12, to be within range for the best opportunity at Turn 1 was difficult.

Max did have a couple of cheaper passes, coming past Liam Lawson who got out of the way and Fernando Alonso who effectively waved him through, but either side of them were measured lunges on Lewis Hamilton, Pierre Gasly and Oscar Piastri, before the race winning dive on Esteban Ocon.

Verstappen just had so much confidence on the brakes into the first corner that he was happy to throw dives from miles back. Really these weren’t lunges in the classic sense – he simply had a feel for the limit of grip that was way beyond most of the field.

READ MORE: Verstappen reflects on ‘absolutely crazy’ Sao Paulo GP after sublime climb from P17 to victory as he extends title lead

In theory passing Piastri should have been a major challenge given the Australian has Max’s title rival as a team mate, but Max was able to decelerate an incredible 43 metres later than the McLaren driver at Turn 1, in his most opportunistic pass of the race, losing minimal time in a clinical and comfortable pass.

Piastri then tried to copy Verstappen’s effort on Liam Lawson a number of laps later and rather than cruising past, made a clumsy effort that earned Oscar a deserved penalty. Verstappen made the moves look easy when they were far from that.

Of course the leaders’ pit stops and red flag changed the course of the race, but it wasn’t by chance that Esteban Ocon, Verstappen and Pierre Gasly made the most of it. Both Alpine drivers were incredibly switched on to the almost inevitability of a red flag and Red Bull and Max knew it as well.

It was a well calculated risk from those that gained and it paid off, as it so often does for Max and Red Bull.

READ MORE: ‘It was a masterclass’ – Horner enthused by Verstappen’s sensational victory in Sao Paulo

When you think back to pit calls in mixed conditions at Silverstone and also Montreal, Max and the Red Bull team have a great track record of executing the right strategy and avoiding so many potential banana skins, where pitting on the exact lap can win or lose you the race.

McLaren and Norris conversely blew yet another opportunity by not being as forward thinking as those around them.

The finishing flair for Max was in setting a string of fastest laps to demolish the field once he hit the front and he showed himself to be in a class of one. Head and shoulders clear of the field, he completed his turnaround from 16th to victory and by a near 20-second margin.

The grid in 2024 is filled with a huge amount of talent, and yet so many other big names struggled. Lando Norris had a couple of late restart errors, Fernando Alonso crashed and spun on Sunday, Carlos Sainz also crashed in both qualifying and the race, Lewis Hamilton struggled for pace throughout and Charles Leclerc also slithered off the road late on at Turn 4.

All of these drivers are world class talents who often thrive in these conditions, but made errors on a day where so much could go wrong. This Grand Prix was a clear display that Max is currently a step ahead of the rest and will be the deserving champion of 2024.

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