Spielberg, 3 July 2023 (dpa/MIA) - World champion Max Verstappen continued his domination of the Formula One season with victory at the Austrian home grand prix of his Red Bull team on Sunday, which saw him move ahead of Ayrton Senna in the all-time list.

Verstappen reversed last year's order when he beat Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, while Sergio Perez rose from 15th on the grid to third on the podium in the other Red Bull.

So big was Verstappen's dominance that he could even afford a last-gasp pit stop to claim the extra point for fastest race lap on the last lap.

Track limit violations had occurred all weekend, and on Sunday nine drivers, including Ferrari's Carlos Sainz and seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes received five-second penalties for it as the race took place.

Eight drivers were punished well after the race had finished, with Hamilton and Sainz given another five-second penalty and places in the top 10 being rearranged.

The most severe sanction of going over track limits went to Alpine's Esteban Ocon, who was given four penalties and 30 seconds on his time late on Sunday.

Nyck de Vries (Alpha Tauri/15 seconds), Pierre Gasly (Alpine/10), Logan Sargeant (Williams/10), Alexander Albon (Williams/10) and Yuki Tsunoda (Alpha Tauri/5) were also sanctioned.

Verstappen had no such trouble en route to his fifth victory in Spielberg and 42nd overall in his career on a weekend where he also topped all other sessions: practice and qualifying on Friday, and Saturday's shoot-out qualifying and sprint race.

He now has one victory more than the Brazilian icon Senna for outright fifth in F1 history, with only Hamilton (103), Michael Schumacher (91), Sebastian Vettel (53) and Alain Prost (51) ahead.

Verstappen leads the championship 81 points ahead of Perez with his seventh victory from nine races heading into next weekend's British Grand Prix - putting him firmly on course towards a third straight title.

But he said that "I don't like to think about that yet. I'm just enjoying the moment driving this car and working with this team. The Sprint weekend is always hectic and a lot of things can go wrong but luckily a lot of things went right.

"I'm just very happy with this weekend and we'll focus again on Silverstone."

A minute's silence was observed before the start for Dutch teenager Danilo van't Hoff who died the previous day following a crash in a Formula Regional race at Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium.

There was no heated duel at the start between Verstappen and Perez as in Saturday's sprint which caused an angry reaction from the champion, because Perez was far back after track limit violations had wiped out his fast laps.

Verstappen won the start from Leclerc and Sainz, barely staying ahead of Leclerc, and also stayed ahead in a lap four restart after the safety car had come out following front wing damage of Tsunoda's Alpha Tauri.

Haas driver Nico Hülkenberg was the first to retire which led to a virtual safety car (VSC) which made most drivers pit - but not the Red Bulls.

"Most important for me was lap one to stay in front. After that we could do our own race. We opted not to box under the VSC and do our normal strategy and that worked out well. Our stints were perfect and I enjoyed it a lot," Verstappen said.

Verstappen eventually pitted on lap 25 and re-emerged in third behind the Ferraris. But he needed only 10 laps to first pass Sainz and then hunt down Leclerc and fly past him into the lead on turn three.

Perez and Sainz were engaged in a thrilling battle for third, with the Ferrari defending himself superbly before finally succumbing with 10 laps left.

"It's been a bit of a rough patch for me but hopefully now we are back and can keep that consistency," said Perez, who defied sickness at the start of the weekend and his latest qualifying hiccup.

Leclerc said: "It wasn’t enough but it's good to be back on the podium as the last few races had been a bit more difficult."

Hamilton complained that he could hardly keep his car within track limits and also frequently asked about penalties for other drivers, with team principal Toto Wolff telling him in the late stages: "Lewis we know the car is bad, please drive it."

Aston Martin lodged a protest against the results after the ninth race of the 22-race season.

A total of 1,200 suspected cases of going outside track limits had to be examined. This had not been possible during the race due to the huge number stewards had to get through.

As a result, Sainz was dropped from fourth to sixth, Hamilton from seventh to eighth and Gasly from ninth to 10th but the podium places were unaffected. Lando Norris and Fernando Alonso ended up fourth and fifth, with George Russell seventh and Lance Stroll ninth.

The track layout as well as the driving style of the drivers had contributed to the problem all weekend. Stewards said a gravel trap should be built on one corner to help deter drivers from crossing the white line.

Photo: dpa