The summer break is over for the Formula 1 circus as it just made its way to the Netherlands for the 2024 Dutch Grand Prix, held at the Zandvoort circuit.

The pressure was high for hometown hero Max Verstappen (Red Bull) to win, but things hadn’t been so peachy for him and the team.

With the last four races having four different winners—and Lando Norris (McLaren) slowly catching up in the drivers’ standings—the latter half of the season is truly shaping up to be very interesting.

1. McLaren is the current king of the hill. If it wasn’t already obvious with the team’s both drivers taking their maiden wins this season, McLaren has a rocket ship in its hands.

Even with Norris bottling up his pole-position start to Verstappen, the British driver managed to snatch it back 18 laps later with great ease—and then proceeded to speed away untouched. He finished a remarkable 22.8 seconds ahead of the Red Bull. To top it off, he also took the fastest lap and won Driver of the Day.

His teammate Oscar Piastri was equally rapid, but unfortunately was not as lucky due to a strategy miscalculation of extending his first stint. After pitting from first on Lap 33, he lost track position and dropped to P5. He eventually finished P4 behind Charles Leclerc (Ferrari).

2. Is Red Bull regressing? With a combination of all the drama going on at Red Bull and Adrian Newey having left the team, it’s only a matter of time before the top team starts to slowly lose its grip on the massive lead it has built.

Apart from Verstappen losing the lead to Norris on Lap 18, he radioed to his team that “the car doesn’t respond to my inputs,” showing that the RB18 is not what it used to be. He still had a solid race, finishing second in his 200th Grand Prix.

Meanwhile, his teammate Sergio Perez had a rather unremarkable race, but he finished P6 after losing a duel against Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) from a P5 start.

3. Charles Leclerc’s hard-fought podium finish. While this race was all about McLaren, Ferrari had a good race overall with none of the strategic blunders they are usually famous for.

Leclerc had qualified in P6, but quickly rose up the ranks with an opportunistic pit stop on Lap 25. On the hard compound, he was able to manage his pace for third place, which still wasn’t enough to catch Verstappen in second.

Instead, Leclerc’s closest competitor was Oscar Piastri, who would constantly be within a second from him multiple times in the race.

Teammate Carlos Sainz finished P5 from a P10 start in a trouble-free race, making a few notable overtakes. He battled Perez in the latter stages of the race.

4. Alpine seems to have finally found its footing. The French team has had a very rough start to the year, finding itself as one of the backmarkers. Amid all the reorganization chaos and upgrades, the team was able to net itself some solid results for this Grand Prix.

Under the new leadership of Oliver Oakes, the team was able to manage a strong finish of P9 for Pierre Gasly and P15 for Esteban Ocon.

Gasly’s race was exciting, as the team had made the right strategy call to be able to overtake rivals with fresher tires. Lap 40 was also notable for a tight five-car battle among Alexander Albon (Williams), Gasly, Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin), Kevin Magnussen (Haas), and Lance Stroll (Aston Martin).

Toward the closing stages of the race, Gasly was able to overtake Nico Hulkenberg (Haas) for the ninth position.

On the other hand, Ocon’s race was hampered by traffic and blue flags, hence his subpar finish.

5. Lewis Hamilton’s recovery drive. While not exactly a “recovery” drive in the sense of a last-to-first recovery, it was still a remarkable effort from the Mercedes-AMG driver.

Hamilton had a poor qualifying result in P12, and a penalty further dropped him down to P14 due to him impeding Perez. Regardless, this race saw a reinvigorated Hamilton claw his way up through the ranks to a respectable P8 finish in the points.

His teammate George Russell also finished ahead of him in P7 from a P4 start, but the duo could’ve finished higher if it weren’t for the team’s mysterious lack of pace compared to the previous race.

The next race will take place on September 1 (9pm, Philippine time) at the famed Autodromo Nazionale Monza circuit in Italy.