Lewis Hamilton took a controlled victory to win in China and extended his championship lead to 13 points over Sebastian Vettel, but the race ended disappointedly as it was the sixth race in Formula One history to finish behind the safety car.
The Briton drove the race with pace still in hand, unleashing the pace of his Silver Arrow at each round of pitstops, which even teammate Nico Rosberg had no answer for. It appeared that Hamilton was driving at a pace to keep the Ferrari's at arms length while eking out his tyre life to optimise his strategy.
Rosberg, finished second behind his teammate; but was not happy with Hamilton. In the post race press conference the German accused Hamilton of intentionally trying to back him up into the chasing Vettel - which the latter denied.
Sebastian Vettel finished his third race as a Ferrari driver with a third podium finish; however this might not have been the result, had the safety car not have been called due to Max Verstappen's stranded Toro Rosso, as teammate Kimi Raikkonen was quickly gaining on the German with tyres which were four laps younger.
It was another average race for Williams with Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas finishing fifth and six respectively, after having not featuring heavily in the race other than at the race start.
Romain Grosjean finished in seventh to claim his and Lotus' first points of the season - which he later dedicated to good friend and fellow Frenchman Jules Bianchi. Teammate Pastor Maldonado had to retire from the race after suffering a collision with Jenson Button (who was penalised for the incident post race).
Sauber carried on their fine form with Felipe Nasr finishing in eighth, and teammate Marcus Ericsson finished in tenth after racing against Sergio Perez for much of the race.
It was yet another race to forget for Red Bull after Daniil Kvyat had to retire due to an engine failure - further reinforcing the issues with the Renault engine. Daniel Ricciardo finished in ninth place to score two points for the team.
It is worth noting, although they finished in 12th and 14th it was a good day for McLaren with both drivers seeing the chequered flag for the first time this season - still no points but signs of progress for the team.
The skill and talent of rookie Max Verstappen continues to be evident with yet another great performance which included overtakes on Ericsson and Sergio Perez - it was a great shame that it ended in a retirement for the young Dutchman that brought about the safety car that brought an anti climatic end to the race.
Nico Hulkenberg was the last of the non-finishers, retiring on lap 6 due to a gearbox failure.
Final results:
- Lewis Hamilton
- Nico Rosberg
- Sebastian Vettel
- Kimi Raikkonen
- Felipe Massa
- Valtteri Bottas
- Romain Grosjean
- Felipe Nasr
- Daniel Ricciardo
- Marcus Ericsson
- Sergio Perez
- Fernando Alonso
- Carlos Sainz Junior
- Jenson Button
- Will Stevens
- Roberto Merhi
- Max Verstappen (DNF)
Pastor Maldonado
Daniil Kvyat
Nico Hulkenberg
The next race is next weekend in Bahrain where the support series GP2 will be racing for the first time this season.
Last edited:
). I hope that next weekend will be more exciting!
