Belgian GP Results:
Once again, another fantastic race for the 2014 season. Be assured, it was filled with wheel-to-wheel racing and drama. And that drama started before the first lap. Fernando Alonso had mechanics around his car, on the starting grid after the 15 second mark. When the officials call the 15 second mark, all staff, media and team engineers and workers must be off the grid. But due to some issues with Alonso's car, the mechanics ran off at the very last moment. Due to this, the Spaniard was given a 5-second-stop-go-penalty during the first few laps.
On lap 2, the two Mercedes AMG Petronas drivers made pretty bad contact when Rosberg's front wing clipped Hamilton's rear tyre, which caused a puncture and forced him to pit early. Rosberg pitted early as well, needing a new front wing. Of course, this caused much drama afterwards and both drivers aren't really wanting to comment on the situation. Unfortunately for Lewis Hamilton, more damage was sustained to his car than originally thought and both he and the team decided to safe the car and engine by retiring from the race.
Both Pastor Maldonado & Andre Lotterer were unable to complete the first few laps when both had to stop and retire due to failures in the car. Andre, who was debuting his first F1 race with Caterham, in place of Kamui Kobayashi for the Belgian GP, said he noticed a loss of power right at the start. Pastor Maldonado, saw smoke coming from his Lotus right before he retired. Pastor's team-mate, Romain Grosjean ended up retiring later on in the race due to damage to his car from debris.
Ricciardo was quick to jump into the lead after the drama with the Mercedes drivers. Another finding himself in a good position was Kimi Raikkonen, who has had a particularly rough start to his first season back with Ferrari. Valtteri Bottas, was eager to get up into the front rows as well.
For Force India, they were already looking strong half-way through the race. Nico had jumped from 18th all the way to 12th. Sergio from 13th to 9th.
In the final laps, Alonso found himself in a cluster of cars, with Magnussen and Button surrounding him and Vettel behind. During this situation, Magnussen forced Alonso off the circuit while they were trying to pass eachother. While this wasn't on purpose, it was called to the FIA and Magnussen was given 20 seconds added to his final race time. So in end, he went from placing 7th to 12th.
Vettel also made contact with Alonso, causing some debri to fly off of the cars. Both went on to finish the race, although maybe not in the positions they had hoped for.
Someone who also didn't get the race he'd hoped for was Jules Bianchi who had to retire due to a gearbox issue, however, his team-mate, Max Chilton finished 16th. Max originally had sold his race seat for the weekend, to Alexander Rossi, but ended up stepping back in after Rossi drove in FP1. Much drama is still surrounding the situation.
A good day for the Sauber team, who saw both of their drivers finish in the top 15. This means things are looking up after a tough first half of the season. They are currently 10th in the Championship but we know they have the power to score points before the end of the season.
In the end, Daniel Ricciardo took home his 3rd win of the season, with Rosberg finishing second and Bottas in 3rd. Rosberg was booed on the podium by what were said to be fans upset about the accident involving Hamilton early on in the race.
Here are the final results from the race and please note that the standings did change after Magnussen's penalty, so we are giving you the standings post-penalty.
RACE RESULTS:
1. Daniel Ricciardo / Red Bull-Renault / Australia / + 25 Points
2. Nico Rosberg / Mercedes-Mercedes / Germany / + 18 Points
3. Valtteri Bottas / Williams-Mercedes / Finland / + 15 Points
4. Kimi Raikkonen / Ferrari-Ferrari / Finland / + 12 Points
5. Sebastian Vettel / Red Bull-Renault / Germany / + 10 Points
6. Jenson Button / McLaren-Mercedes / Great Britain / + 8 Points
7. Fernando Alonso / Ferrari-Ferrari / Spain / + 6 Points
8. Sergio Perez / Force India-Mercedes / Mexico / + 4 Points
9. Daniil Kvyat / Toro Rosso-Renault / + 2 Points
10. Nico Hulkenberg / Force India-Mercedes / + 1 Point
11. Jean Eric Vergne / Toro Rosso-Renault / France / + 0 Points
12. Kevin Magnussen / McLaren-Mercedes / Denmark / + 0 Points
13. Felipe Massa / Williams-Mercedes / Brazil / + 0 Points
14. Adrian Sutil / Sauber-Ferrari / Germany / + 0 Points
15. Esteban Gutierrez / Sauber-Ferrari / Mexico / + 0 Points
16. Max Chilton / Marussia-Ferrari / Great Britain / + 0 Points
17. Marcus Ericsson / Caterham-Renault / Sweden / + 0 Points
RETIRED - Jules Bianchi / Marussia-Ferrari / France / Gearbox Failure
RETIRED - Lewis Hamilton / Mercedes-Mercedes / Great Britain / Collision Damage
RETIRED - Romain Grosjean / Lotus-Renault / France / Debris Damage
RETIRED - André Lotterer / Caterham-Renault / Germany / Exhaust Failure
RETIRED - Pastor Maldonado / Lotus-Renault / Venezuela / Power Unit Failure
Thank you all for joining us on Twitter for our live commentary for the Belgian GP weekend. We'll be preparing for Monza this week so look for our Circuit Schedule and Circuit Preview, where we'll also re-cap the 2013 Italian GP! You can follow us on Twitter @F1Insider78
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Article Written By: Amy Hawk
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