Hamilton wins Spain thrillerposted in F111 | 05 | 2014
LEWIS HAMILTON FOUGHT off his fast-charging Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg to win his fourth successive F1 grand prix, and take the lead in the world championship.
Hamilton, who started the Spanish Grand Prix from pole position, led home the dominant Mercedes 1-2 as the cars lapped the Circuit de Catalunya more than a second-a-lap faster than rivals.
Both Mercedes drivers made two pitstops, but Rosberg — who started from second on the grid, tried to outwit Hamilton by going for an alternative tyre strategy.
The German ran three laps longer than the 2008 world champ in the first stint before switching to Pirelli's hard tyre rather than taking another set of the mediums on which they both started.
The key to the race then became whether Rosberg could keep the gap to Hamilton around two seconds in order to jump him with an earlier final stop.
Related: Hamilton bags F1 hat-trick
But by the time both cars decided to pit, Hamilton had maintained the gap at four seconds, and Rosberg rejoined again still in second place with 23 of the 66 laps remaining.
The German — now on the quicker compound tyres — began reeling Hamilton in, but the Englishman fended off his team-mate's charge over the closing five laps to win by 0.636s.
Behind the all-conquering Mercedes duo, Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo claimed his maiden podium finish in F1 by taking third, ahead of team-mate and four-time world champ Sebastian Vettel. The swashbuckling German had started the race from 15th after suffering a five-slot grid penalty for a gearbox change.
And while the Williams of Valtteri Bottas impressed by finishing fifth, the two Ferraris of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkoenn were locked in their own personal duel for sixth and seventh.
In the end, it was the Spaniard who sealed sixth, having opted for an aggressive three-stop strategy, which allowed him to overhaul Raikkonen in the closing laps on fresher tyres.
And while Romain Grosjean scored the first points of the season for Lotus in eighth, the top 10 was rounded off by the Force India pair, Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg.
It was yet another disappointing day for McLaren, with Jenson Button and Kevin Magnussen only managing 11th and 12th respectively
DRIVERS' QUOTES:
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes:
"It's fantastic to get my first win here after eight attempts and it's really difficult to put that feeling into words right now. We have our bosses from Mercedes-Benz here today and it's great for the team that we were able to give them a one-two finish. In all my career, I've never before had a car or a performance gap like this.
"Nico drove a fantastic race and I struggled to keep him behind, but I just managed it at the end. I had the same problems with the car this afternoon that I found yesterday in qualifying: I couldn't attack the corners properly because of snap oversteer and that's where Nico was catching me.
"I'm just so proud of this team: we are looking very strong and I'm enjoying every moment and every step of the way. There's still a long way to go this season, though, so we are staying humble, getting our heads down and working hard. I still have a bit more time to find from the car because it's very, very close with Nico, so I have to keep working on that. But it's a great feeling to be leading the championship."
Nico Rosberg, Mercedes:
"The race was so close at the end today and with one more lap, I could have tried to overtake Lewis for the first time. My start was bad. It is a weakness that we have and we will try to improve.
"Once it was clear that I was in second place, we chose to go with the slower strategy using the prime tyres in the middle stint to get a shot at Lewis at the end when I was on the options. It was very close but not quite close enough so naturally I'm disappointed but I can take a lot of positives from this weekend.
"We have an amazing car and my pace was really strong here so I just need to find an extra little edge to capitalise on. The next race is Monaco which is not only my home race but has some great memories from my victory there last year."
Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull:
“Holy Doly! The race was not overly exciting, although I don't know how it was behind, maybe there were a lot of fights going on and for viewers there was a bit more to watch, but for us it was a good result. We knew we could not catch the Mercedes, but we believed we had better pace than the guys behind, so before the race we’d said that third was going to be a good day.
"It's nice to stand back up on the podium – I actually still feel a bit awkward up there, but I'm sure I will get more comfortable. It seems at the moment it’s Mercedes who are battling between themselves and they are doing a tremendous job. With Seb coming through the pack for fourth today, it seems we have been the second best team this weekend.
"I think it is still going to vary a bit, but maybe it will be a battle for that last place on the podium with me and Seb in Monaco, we will see. Monaco should be okay for us and hopefully we can get a bit closer to the Mercs there. It will be interesting and we will try as much as we can to catch them!”
Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull:
“All in all I think that was the best that we could do today; the start was not so great and I lost a place, but then I was able to get it back towards the end of the lap; it’s always tricky when you are further back. It was a very busy first lap. I was then sort of stuck in the train, so I couldn't really feel how far we could go today and how quick we were, but once we came in I was on the harder tyre and was able to stick with the people in front and even catch them a little bit. I think we realised that the pace was there and after that we had two fresh sets of tyres from yesterday, so we could go even further up the road! I enjoyed it a lot and I think fourth was the best we could do today.
"Daniel drove a good race today and I think, from a team point of view, third and fourth is what we could get today. Mercedes is very strong — they have a phenomenal engine, two very good drivers, a very good car, and a very good team, they're doing a good job so it would be wrong to complain and moan about how dominant they are — they worked better than everyone else in the winter and deserve to be in that position. Hopefully, from our point of view, rather sooner than later we'll give them a hard time: that’s our motivation. I hope that in time we can catch up, and as I said start giving them a run for their money.”
Valtteri Bottas, Williams:
“Today we did our best. The strategy was correct and the team did really well in the pitstops, I made no mistake on the track so we made the maximum of what was on offer and got some good points from it. It's pleasing to be in the points and it equals my best ever result. It was a shame Vettel was so quick at the end, I tried to defend, but he had fresher tyres. The atmosphere in the team is fantastic, we are all pushing forward and points feed that hunger."
Fernando Alonso, Ferrari:
“Of course I’d have liked to have done better here in my home race, but I knew right from the start that it would be difficult. Our pace was too slow compared to the leaders and on top of that, not making up any places at the start didn’t help. The gap to the best is nothing new and today’s result confirms the fact our rivals are strong on both the performance and the reliability fronts, but until it is mathematically impossible to catch them we will continue to believe and do all we can to catch up.
"The decision to go for a three stop strategy was taken in an attempt to cover Vettel, but unfortunately I lost the place at the pit stop and I only managed to make up one on Kimi, who was impossible to pass when we were on the same tyres. In the two weeks to go to the Monaco Grand Prix, we will continue to work day and night: we definitely can’t expect to have a new car, because you can’t achieve a revolution in such a short space of time, but we will do our very best to improve in all areas.”
Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari:
“That was a complicated race for me, with the main problem being a lack of grip and in general, it was very difficult to find the right balance on the car. Going for a two stop strategy proved to be the wrong choice because tyre degradation meant I couldn’t push all the way to the end.
"Overall here, we went better than in the last race, maybe because the characteristics of this track are very different to those we have raced on so far, but we cannot be happy with sixth and seventh places, because we are a long way off where we want to be. It will take time, but we will do our utmost, because we know where we must keep pushing if we want to improve.”
Roman Grosjean, Lotus:
“It’s been a tough battle for us to get points this season and that was certainly one of the hardest races I’ve contested in a long time. I did everything I could to drive around the power unit issues,which really made things difficult when battling the other cars. It’s good for all the crew at the track and at Enstone to finally get a reward for all their hard work. There are still a lot of areas where we can improve and certainly the car wasn’t as quick today as it was yesterday, with the different track conditions as well as the other issue. It’s Mothers’ Day in Switzerland so this one’s for my mum!"
Jenson Button, McLaren:
“The start and the first lap cost me a lot of time, and my second pit-stop compromised my strategy. During the first two stints, it felt like we were making progress, because we were faster than the cars in front. But we gambled on taking the second stop early, thinking we could jump one of the Force Indias, but Daniil’s (Kvyat) Toro Rosso followed me in, and caused my release to be delayed by a few seconds while he came past me in the pit-lane.
“Then I came out of the pits just in front of Lewis (Hamilton), who was lapping me. He was running old tyres, while I was on fresh rubber; I had to let him past, but it delayed me a bit more.
“Nonetheless, I think we learnt something useful today. I’ll be staying on here for next week’s test, so hopefully we can learn a bit more again and make further progress. The test should be useful – not necessarily for Monaco, but for two or three races down the road. The midfield is extremely close, so even small improvements will make a difference.”
Kevin Magnussen, McLaren:
“Today was pretty hard work. I made a good start, and was having a really good first lap. Then, into Turn 13, I went side by side with Jenson and went wide onto the marbles. As I came back onto the circuit, Sebastian (Vettel) hadn’t seen me, and our cars briefly touched. Luckily, there was no damage to either of our cars, so we could both carry on without problem.
“I knew it would be difficult to go forward from 14thon the grid: the midfield is very tight, so making progress is extremely tough. Moreover, today there was little to choose between the Option and the Prime, which meant we couldn’t use a different strategy from the others’ in an effort to make up places.”
F1 Spanish Grand Prix, Barcelona — Results:
1. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1h41m05.155s;
2. Nico Rosberg Mercedes +0.636s;
3. Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault +49.014s;
4. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault +1m16.702s;
5. Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes +1m19.293s;
6. Fernando Alonso Ferrari +1m27.743s;
7. Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari +1 lap;
8. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault +1 lap;
9. Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes +1 lap;
10. Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes +1 lap;
11. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes +1 lap;
12. Kevin Magnussen McLaren-Mercedes +1 lap;
13. Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes +1 lap;
14. Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso-Renault +1 lap;
15. Pastor Maldonado Lotus-Renault +1 lap;
16. Esteban Gutierrez Sauber-Ferrari +1 lap;
17. Adrian Sutil Sauber-Ferrari +1 lap;
18. Jules Bianchi Marussia-Ferrari +2 laps;
19. Max Chilton Marussia-Ferrari +2 laps;
20. Marcus Ericsson Caterham-Renault +2 laps.
Retirements:
Kamui Kobayashi Caterham-Renault 34 laps
Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Renault 24 laps
Championship standings (After 5 of 19 GP):
Drivers':
1. Lewis Hamilton 100
2. Nico Rosberg 97
3. Fernando Alonso 49
4. Sebastian Vettel 45
5. Daniel Ricciardo 39
6. Nico Hulkenberg 37
7. Valtteri Bottas 34
8. Jenson Button 23
9. Kevin Magnussen 20
10. Sergio Perez 20
11. Kimi Raikkonen 17
12. Felipe Massa 12
13. Romain Grosjean 4
14. Jean-Eric Vergne 4
15. Daniil Kvyat 4
Constructors':
1. Mercedes 197
2. Red Bull-Renault 84
3. Ferrari 66
4. Force India-Mercedes 57
5. Williams-Mercedes 46
6. McLaren-Mercedes 43
7. Toro Rosso-Renault 8
8. Lotus-Renault 4
9. Sauber-Ferrari 0
10. Marussia-Ferrari 0
11. Caterham-Renault 0
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Jim McGill
Photo: Copyright — Mercedes GP