Lewis Hamilton put all the drama of the last few weeks
behind him to record his sixth victory of the year and close the gap to his
Mercedes team mate Nico Rosberg down to 22 points. If he wins the next four
races with Rosberg second he’ll retake the championship lead by the end of the
USA Grand Prix. If only life was that simple.
The way this season is going we can expect plenty more
ups and downs before the end, today Lewis’ race encapsulated just how tough it’s
going to be but also gave a marker of just how much recent events has altered
the mind sets of Mercedes two drivers; Hamilton has renewed confidence and feels the team is behind him while Rosberg appeared defensive all weekend and made another critical error which might have cost him the win.
First of all though Hamilton had awesome speed all
weekend finally getting back to pole position, his first since the Spanish
Grand Prix all the way back in May. It was a fantastic lap that really demonstrated to Rosberg just what he has to contend with in the final six races. Despite all the mind games and the dramas going on behind the scenes
and often in front of the cameras Rosberg is up against the fastest driver in
Formula 1, and it’s going to take all his tactical nous to hold him off.
Lewis may have got the top grid slot but as seems to be the
way for him, he rarely gets a straight forward win. His launch system wasn’t
working properly and he got bogged down at the start allowing not only Rosberg
to charge ahead but Kevin Magnussen who got a great start from fifth was
second while Felipe Massa jumped into third.
It didn’t look comfortable at first for the 44 Mercedes, he
wasn’t immediately on to the pack of Massa nor did it look like it was going to
be an easy pass on the Brazilian, the Williams is extremely quick on the
straight. But whatever problems he had were cured and within a few laps both
Massa and Hamilton got ahead of the over performing Magnussen.
There was a lot of hype before the start of the weekend that
Williams might well have the pace to compete for the win but a terrible start
from Valtteri Bottas in third dropped him down the field, and despite only
lapping a few tenths away from Silver Arrow pace Massa was never really in
contention.
It didn’t stop Lewis having to make quite the move on his
2008 title rival. On lap nine Rosberg had failed to make too much of an
advantage while Lewis was stuck and even went off at the first chicane. Perhaps
this encouraged Lewis, the very next lap he had his DRS open, Massa defended
the inside line into the first chicane but always last of the late brakers the
Mercedes swept around the outside into turn one and held the inside for turn
two, he was through and now the charge began.
He slowly but surely trimmed down Rosberg’s advantage, lap
after lap with barely an intermission the gap was cut. Rosberg hadn’t looked on
Hamilton’s pace all weekend and now it was being firmly shown. Being the lead
driver Rosberg had first call on pit strategy. This race is a one stop most of
the time and so it proved for almost all the runners today. Lewis pitted a lap
after Rosberg on lap 25 with just 28 to run, he exited the pit lane not far
behind.
His engineer came on the radio advising to hang back around
two seconds and save the tyres for an attack at the end of the race. Lewis
doesn’t do hanging back if he can avoid it so it wasn’t so much of a surprise to
see him immediately set the fastest lap of the race. From
nearing two seconds after the stops, in less than two laps it was under a
second. It was ‘hammertime’ for Hamilton and he was closing and in DRS
range, the move was surely about to be made.
But then was this the moment Rosberg cracked? The pressure
must have told a little bit, Hamilton was catching him relentlessly, was
Rosberg ready after all the outrage of a fortnight ago to go wheel to wheel
with his championship rival once more? Approaching the first chicane on lap 29
he made the same mistake he had earlier in the race, briefly locking up before
taking to the escape road. It was enough to allow Hamilton into the lead and
from then on he wasn’t challenged.
Lewis rolled off the laps to take a resounding win and lay
down a marker to Rosberg that he’s coming for him. Rosberg finished three
seconds down and although annoyed with himself for the mistake didn’t look too down with the end result. He knows there will still be weekends when he’s
quicker and he also knows how unlikely it is Mercedes will finish 1-2 for the
next four races, especially when you factor in engine penalties that many teams
are bound to need to take.
But this race victory was something both would have
desperately wanted after the Spa antics to show the other just who is in
control. Well Lewis certainly showed who was in command this weekend but for
the championship Nico remains the man with the best cards. After the
disciplinary action Mercedes took against him after Spa, the mistake this
weekend and Lewis looking mentally stronger than he’s ever been, could it be Rosberg’s
about to cave?
The battles for points in another action filled race
Behind the Mercedes duo Massa maintained his third place to
the finish completely untroubled. In many ways he was the star of the race but
apart from the early laps wasn’t really involved in much of the action. He
calmly ran his race and for once this year managed to stay out of trouble and finally
claim the podium he deserved with a brilliant performance in front of the
Ferrari public who still have a lot of affection for their former driver. A
nice way to celebrate being re-signed.
His Williams team mate Bottas finished fourth with a far
more eventful race. Starting third he briefly dropped out of the top 10 and a
bit like Hamilton in the opening couple of laps looked like he was a bit stuck.
But soon the beautiful Martini liveried Williams was going wheel to wheel with
half the field to fight his way up the order.
He used the DRS on the start finish straight to his
advantage, utilising his straight line speed but he was braking brilliantly
into the first chicane and took many drivers including Kimi Raikkonen, Jenson
Button, Sergio Perez, Fernando Alonso, Kevin Magnussen and Sebastian Vettel
with sublime moves which were made to look deftly simple.
He made a lot of progress in his first stint but after his
pit stop he dropped back behind many of them and had to fight to get back
ahead. This time his move against Magnussen was not as simple, they both braked
late into the first chicane, Bottas alongside the McLaren driver but Magnussen
was on the inside line. It’s such a tight corner and very narrow Bottas was
always going to back out or crash. He backed out and went over the kerbs.
The stewards thought Magnussen should have left more room
and subsequently added five seconds to his finishing time. It was a harsh
penalty and to my mind unjustified. What happened to the leniency that the
stewards were showing? Derrick Warwick was the driver steward and he does seem
to come down hard a lot of the time, but I don’t think Magnussen could have
done anything different, he was defending his position, even Bottas said after
the race it shouldn’t have been a penalty.
But there you go, another lesson for Magnussen on the
fickleness of steward decisions and his second consecutive penalty, both
arguably a bit harsh although the incident in Spa was deserved. Whatever though, he's getting more impressive as the season goes on.
Bottas got the job done later and finished fourth while
Magnussen held on for seventh which became tenth. Sergio Perez and Jenson
Button had some of the best side by side action of the season as they exchanged
places back and forth finishing seventh and eighth after Magnussen’s penalty.
Perez in particular overshadowed his Force India team mate
Nico Hulkenberg again. Hulkenberg was anonymous all weekend and is in great
danger of his career being kept in the midfield which would be sad indeed. Kimi
was ninth after a fairly solitary race in which he just seemed to be passed.
Meanwhile his Ferrari team mate Alonso had been mixing it
with these guys before retiring on lap 28 with an energy recovery issue. It was
his first retirement of the year and coming at Monza, Ferrari’s home race, it
was at the worst moment possible. It had been another fine performance from the
Spaniard but the car, as always when it’s Alonso, was the problem.
In fifth and sixth were the two Red Bull’s. Just when you
think Vettel is getting the edge on Daniel Ricciardo, up pops the Australian at
the end of the race just to remind you he is the man at Red Bull. Vettel out
qualified him for the fourth time in five races but yet again was behind at the
finish. Vettel had been quicker all weekend but he was the first driver to stop
for tyres on lap 18, Ricciardo stopp
Once he was ahead of Magnussen he went after Vettel who
defended fairly aggressively but was in no shape to hold him back. Ricciardo
got through and shot off into the distance. It says something brilliant about a
driver who seems off the pace all weekend that he can make it work when it
counts.
Daniil Kvyat survived a scare when challenging Kimi as his
brakes went two laps from home. He managed to make the flag in 11th
after starting 21st because of an engine penalty. His Toro Rosso
team mate Jean-Eric Vergne finished two places behind him after starting nine
places in front. When you’ve lost your drive and you want to show yourself off
that’s not the best way to do it.
Kamui Kobayashi finished ahead of Jules Bianchi for
Caterham. After messing Kamui around he rewards them with a top drive but don’t
be surprised if he’s not there in Singapore, especially as team politics and
undelivered money seems to be throwing this team into turmoil.
Disturbing rumours from Monza
Other financially struggling teams Sauber and Lotus both had
miserable weekends which will only compound their current problems. The latest
rumours emerging from the paddock suggest that there will only be eight teams
in 2015 each with three cars as Formula 1’s unfair dividing of the money
continues to cause problems.
Unfortunately the TV money is locked in until 2020 and F1
teams generally only think of themselves so any who receive more money won’t
want to give up that advantage. For once though I’d like the teams to think of
the sport first rather than themselves because as will have been mentioned
before if there are only eight teams how long till one or two of them go bust
because they’re not performing. Then how many cars will you get each team to
run?
Two car teams is Formula 1, a fair division of monies making teams
sustainable should be the desired aim. Bernie Ecclestone should be thinking of
distributing the money much more fairly rather than giving him and FOM the vast
majority of it as there is enough money in F1 whereby each team could survive
easily.
Anyway onto Singapore where I expect all 11 teams to be
running, Rosberg is traditionally pretty good under the city lights, he nearly
won for Williams a few years ago. He doesn’t have to as he’s plenty in hand but
he’d like to beat Hamilton there, if anything just to stop the momentum
building against him. As for Lewis, well he proved today he knows how to tackle
his championship deficit and that is to attack.
all photo's taken from autosport.com
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