Max Verstappen surprises himself with stunning 'unexpected' Brazilian blitz

Max Verstappen described his stunning São Paulo Grand Prix performance ad "unexpected" and "incredible".

Verstappen became only the eighth driver in F1 history - and the first since Lewis Hamilton in Hungary 2014 - to finish on the podium after starting from the pit lane by taking third behind race winner in McLaren's Lando Norris and runner-up, Kimi Antonelli in his Mercedes.

The Red Bull driver was forced into that start after a wretched qualifying due to the lack of grip and balance from his RB21, leading to the team fitting a completely new power unit and making suspension setup changes.

Verstappen even had to pit early due to picking up a puncture, throwing his plans awry to a certain extent, but he still delivered an astonishing drive, coming within 0.362s of finishing second, and just over seconds behind Norris.

"The race was quite full on, a lot of action," said Verstappen after the race. "I had to overtake some cars, of course, coming from the pit lane. Our pace was quite strong throughout all the stints. It was sometimes a bit difficult to know fully with traffic and stuff.

"But to be on the podium from the pit lane, I didn't expect that at all, even with a puncture as well at the beginning of the race. That is why we had to box again.

"An incredible result for us. Very happy with that, and just very proud of everyone within the team as well.

"Yesterday was very tough for us, but we never give up. We always try to improve and try to find more lap time, and luckily, we found that again today."

As to judging his plethora of overtakes during the race, he added: "Just trying to pass as fast as possible because you don't want to lose too much time, but then some cars were also in DRS trains, so it was not always very straightforward.

"With all that, to finish only 10 seconds from the leader, is incredible."