It was the sort of race that the championships often turn into.
Charles Leclerc was looking at extending his lead in the title race back to the margin of a clear race victory as he ran away with the Spanish Grand Prix. The race fell into the lap of Max Verstappen after his engine failed.
Verstappen spun into the gravel and was stuck behind Mercedes for 20 laps before he and his Red Bull team were able to get back to the front.
Verstappen now has a six-point lead over Leclerc, which he tops for the first time this season.
The statistics look bad for Leclerc and Ferrari.
Verstappen has won every race he has finished this year. He had won his third victory in a row. Red Bull's reliability had been the big question mark, but now it's Ferrari's questions.
There is a complicating factor in the private fight between the two men. Mercedes seem to be heading very quickly in that direction.
After a difficult start to the season, both Russell and Lewis Hamilton look like they could make life difficult for Verstappen and Leclerc.
The race appeared to have surrendered to Leclerc before he retired with an engine problem.
They were in great shape all weekend. The team took their first major upgrade of the season to Spain and it worked out perfectly. After spinning on his first lap, Leclerc nailed his second and took his fourth pole of the season.
After holding off Verstappen on the run to the first corner, he was two seconds in front of the Red Bull when the world champion made a most uncharacteristic mistake and spun at Turn Four. That looked like it was over.
While Verstappen struggled with a faulty DRS overtaking aid to pass Russell's Mercedes, Leclerc did a very impressive 21-lap stint on the soft tyres before his pit stop, and was building his lead again when he cried into the pits.
It was very hard for Leclerc. Verstappen has retired twice this season, but his failures came in races in which he was already beaten by Leclerc. This cost the driver a victory. It is now four-two to Verstappen, from looking like equalling the win score at three-three.
Leclerc was phlegmatic after the race.
He said that he felt better after this weekend than he did the last two weekends.
There was an issue with the car and I am very disappointed, but there were plenty of positive signs throughout the weekend.
The new package worked as expected, and everything was working well, and our race pace and tyre management was strong, which was a relief after two races in which we have been struggling.
It is good to look at the positives in those situations.
His driving was one of them. The car is hard to drive. The rear needs careful treatment, characteristics which are at the root of the difficulties Sainz is having this year, but Leclerc is more at ease with oversteer.
Sainz said that Charles was doing an excellent job with the car as the two men sat with the team boss.
He is driving at a very high level, he is putting together super-impressive lap times, an impressive way of driving, and I can only admire and try in some ways to copy and try to put it a bit more to my liking to be faster.
The medium- and low-speed corners at Barcelona are normally a sign that a car will be strong in Monaco.
It is Leclerc's home race. He was on the pole last year but never finished the race. He needs to break that streak on Sunday.
Verstappen's spin made life difficult for him, but once Leclerc was out the race looked like his to lose.
Red Bull had two cars against Mercedes, and Verstappen was likely to switch to a different strategy because he could not pass Russell.
When Verstappen was in clear air, he was able to use his car's pace, and when Russell emerged from his second stop, he did so behind Verstappen. Red Bull needed to order Perez out of the way after Verstappen stopped for the third time.
After the race, Verstappen had some concerns of his own.
He said that without Charles retirement, he probably would have won the race.
There is a bit of needle in the fight between Red Bull and Ferrari.
Two weeks ago in Miami, Binotto questioned how Red Bull could make so many updates to their car while staying within the budget cap.
Red Bull was able to get Verstappen out of the garage 20 seconds before the pit lane closed.
Red Bull said this was some last-minute tests. They were heating up their fuel in the garage.
Binotto said that it was down to the fuel temperature in the tank, which needs to be a maximum 10C below ambient.
It should be at all times during the event, not only when the car is going out, but in the garage itself.
It is difficult to understand that they were heating up the fuel through a fire. I can only trust the FIA and I am pretty sure they are comfortable, so maybe that is not the right explanation.
Red Bull said there was no issue, and the FIA said that if Red Bull were allowed to leave their garage, it meant that their fuel temperatures were legal.
The spokesman said that if the car left the garage it was legal to have the fuel temperature lower than allowed in the garage.
The race marked a breakthrough for Mercedes, after the introduction of new parts aimed at solving their biggest problem this year - the excessive bouncing.
The parts worked, the porpoising was reduced, and Russell produced the team's best performance of the year in fourth.
His Mercedes lacked the pace of the Red Bulls and Leclerc, but he was highly impressive in his defence against Verstappen, especially a moment when the lead appeared to be lost as Verstappen dived for the inside at Turn One, only for Russell to keep the position by brav
The gap to the front-runners has probably been halved, compared to the rest of the season. I think we know there is more performance to be found.
It has been a season of problem solving, instead of trying to find more performance. I think we have solved our issue. We now have the ability to bring more performance. We are six races behind but there is no reason why we cannot claw this back.
Hamilton suffered a puncture when he was hit by Kevin Magnussen on the first lap. His race after that was outstanding.
He came out of the pits after a change of tires. He had to back off in the last couple of laps to protect his engine, which had lost all its coolant. It was the most important part of the race.
Two races ago, Hamilton was writing off the season, but now he wants to win before it's too late.
He said it was a great sign that we were going in the right direction. I would have been fighting with the Red Bulls if I had that issue at the start.
Wolff went one step further.
He said that he had seen a race car that reminded him of the race cars of previous season when you are behind the rest of the field and come all the way to the front and get a podium.
It shows that we have made another stop.
Can we fight for the world title? We have reasons to believe we can get there, but we need a car that can finish first and second.
The odds are against us but motor racing is a different game. Although they should, they didn't score a lot of points. We are pushing hard to get back into the game.
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