BRITISH GRAND PRIX - RACE
If it was a dry race, then it would be a walk in the park for the Mercedes duo, who haven’t had things easy since last weekend’s race. Fortunately for the rest of the pack, the Great British weather was as unpredictable as ever and the heavens opened just as the Formula One circus gathered on the grid. Now, it was anybody’s game.
Though the rain had stopped by the time the race had started, the decision had already been made to start the race behind the safety car, meaning everybody would be on wet tyres for the start of the race. Five laps in to the scheduled fifty two the safety car came in to the pits and the chaos began.
Almost immediately, a handful of drivers jumped into the pits for intermediate tyres, whilst the top four – Hamilton, Rosberg, Verstappen, and Daniel Ricciardo – stayed out. Ricciardo joined Felipe Massa, Daniil Kvyat and Jenson Button in the pits on the second racing lap, only for Pascal Wehrlein to go spinning into the gravel and bring out the virtual safety car. It was enough of a buffer for Hamilton, Rosberg, and Verstappen to pit without losing any places, even though the Red Bull pit stop wasn’t anything the team would be proud of.
The first big battle came from behind Carlos Sainz, who was having the defend against both Williams drivers, Nico Hulkenberg, Fernando Alonso, and a recovering Sebastian Vettel. It was Hulkenberg causing the drama, trying to get past Valtteri Bottas. The German couldn’t get past him, but a spin for Bottas at Vale sent him back to thirteenth and out of the fight.
Hulkenberg was still pushing, Massa now in his sights. The Force India driver tried to get past him, only for Massa to cut him off. Hulkenberg was taken out of the battle when he went wide, wet patches on the track catching him out. Now he needed to turn to defence with Fernando Alonso pushing behind him.
Vettel was the first driver to switch to slick tyres, just before the halfway point of the race. The Ferrari driver pitted for medium compound tyres, his team mate following him a lap later, triggering another rush in the pits. It looked like it might be a little too early, though, when Vettel spun a lap later, heading on to the grass at turn one. He was able to keep going, soon setting the fastest lap.
Palmer was one of the drivers to head into the pits, but it wasn’t a clean stop for the Renault team. The Brit was sent out of the pits, leaving his right rear wheel behind. He was able to be pushed back to the pits and continued the race, but he was soon handed a ten second stop go penalty for the incident.
Up at the front of the pack, Hamilton was pulling away from Rosberg easily enough, but the German wasn’t having such an easy time, with Verstappen pushing hard against the championship leader. The Red Bull was running at the same pace as Hamilton, around a second faster than Rosberg, but he was having to weave about the track to find wet spots to cool his tyres.
Just before the halfway point, as the pits for slicks was beginning, Verstappen came alongside the Mercedes, managing to get past Rosberg on the track. Rosberg tried to fight back, but Verstappen was able to stay ahead, and set off to chase after Hamilton, who was over six second ahead of them.
The patchy track was giving a lot of drivers problems, with both Toro Rosso drivers, Raikkonen, and Alonso spinning at turn one. Haryanto was the first driver who was taken out of the race because of it, though. The Indonesian driver spun into the gravel and came into the wall, ending his race and bringing out the yellow flags.
Meanwhile, Rosberg was trying to take the second place back from Verstappen, who was having trouble getting around back markers. Verstappen had managed to shorten the gap to Hamilton to about four seconds, but Rosberg was less than a second behind the Red Bull and catching up. The German took to DRS, but couldn’t get past the teenager until lap thirty nine.
Rosberg was now pushing to catch up with Hamilton, but it wasn’t to be. A gear box problem had him going extremely slowly at some corners, and it soon became clear that seventh gear was a problem for the Mercedes driver. The team coached him through how to handle the problem, which the stewards were soon concerned about.
The regulations restrict what the teams can say on the radio. In Baku, Mercedes couldn’t tell Hamilton how to solve a problem with his car because of the regulations and now it seemed they’d broken this very same rule. The incident was investigated after the race, leaving Rosberg to struggle on with his upset gear box to try to catch up with his team mate. Rosberg was never able to catch up with Hamilton, and had to settle for second.
Further down, Vettel was on a recovery drive, pushing hard against Felipe Massa. The German ran wide, pushing Massa off with him. Both drivers carried on, Massa just slightly annoyed. It was deemed an illegal move by the stewards and Vettel was handed a five-second-time penalty. At the time it was awarded, Daniil Kvyat was within five seconds, and Jenson Button not too far behind. It looked like Button might be able to get some points from a disappointing weekend at Silverstone, but he couldn’t get within the five seconds, and Kvyat finished the race just outside the five seconds, meaning Vettel would keep his ninth place finish.
After the race, it was deemed Mercedes had broken the rules when Rosberg’s engineer told him how to solve his gear box problem The German was given a ten-second-time penalty which dropped him down to third, promoting Max Verstappen to second.
RESULTS:
1. Lewis Hamilton / Mercedes-Mercedes / Great Britain / + 25 Points
2. Max Verstappen / Red Bull-TAG-HEUER / Netherlands / + 18 Points
3. Nico Rosberg / Mercedes-Mercedes / Germany / + 15 Points*
4. Daniel Ricciardo / Red Bull-TAG-HEUER / Australia / + 12 Points
5. Kimi Raikkonen / Ferrari-Ferrari / Finland / + 10 Points
6. Sergio Perez / Force India-Mercedes / Mexico / + 8 Points
7. Nico Hulkenberg / Force India-Mercedes / Germany / + 6 Points
8. Carlos Sainz / Toro Rosso-Ferrari / Spain / + 4 Points
9. Sebastian Vettel / Ferrari-Ferrari / Germany / + 2 Points
10. Daniil Kvyat / Toro Rosso-Ferrari / Russia / +1 Point
11. Felipe Massa / Williams-Mercedes / Brazil
12. Jenson Button / McLaren-Honda / Great Britain
13. Fernando Alonso / McLaren-Honda / Spain
14. Valtteri Bottas / Williams-Mercedes / Finland
15. Felipe Nasr / Sauber-Ferrari / Brazil
16. Esteban Gutierrez / Haas-Ferrari / Mexico
17. Kevin Magnussen / Renault-Renault / Denmark / Gearbox**
RETIRED - Jolyon Palmer / Renault-Renault / Great Britain / Gearbox
RETIRED - Rio Haryanto / Manor-Mercedes / Indonesia / Spun off
RETIRED - Romain Grosjean / Haas-Ferrari / France / Gearbox
RETIRED - Marcus Ericsson / Sauber-Ferrari / Sweden / Electrical
RETIRED - Pascal Wehrlein / Manor-Mercedes / Germany / Spun off
* - (Rosberg) Ten-Second-Time Penalty due to illegal radio messages
** - (Magnussen) Qualified as finished / Retired with gearbox problem
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Article Written By: Bethonie Waring
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