
Red Bull/Getty Images
Max Verstappen hailed an "amazing" day as he secured his maiden Formula 1 victory in his first race for Red Bull.
Verstappen moved up to second place at the start following the collision between Mercedes pair Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, and went on to take the lead courtesy of a two-stop strategy, with team-mate Daniel Ricciardo on a three-stop approach which proved to be slower.
Verstappen kept Kimi Raikkonen at bay across the final 20 laps to hold on and claim his first victory in the sport at the age of 18.
"It is a very big surprise, of course I didn’t expect," he said.
"The first stint on Soft tyres I could keep up quite well after the Mercedes crashed.
"Sometimes you start to destroy tyres so I lost ground and we decided to pit, on Mediums the car felt great, I was managing my speed, my tyres, was just managing everything.
"We did the best strategy possible, had a bit of pressure from Kimi behind but it is difficult to overtake so it was a case of not making mistakes, no front locking, it worked. I was targeting a podium but to get a win straightaway is amazing."