Mumbai: Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton overcame a chaotic start to the Chinese Grand Prix and eventually win the title on Sunday, which his fifth in Shanghai. The Brit started from pole position and led from the inception to end while annexing his 54th race title of career and his first of the new Formula One season.
Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari recovered from a mishap-filled start to finish second, 6.2 seconds behind the Mercedes driver while
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen imrpoved from 16th position on the starting grid to finish third, trashing off a spirited challenge from teammate Daniel Ricciardo on the final lap.
Red Bull driver, Max Verstappen was on a superb streak of overtaking, he struggled his way to the third position from the bottom end of the grid. This, was by far Max’s one of the most memorable races ever. “I think I’ve passed nine cars on my first lap. It felt a little bit like a video game for me,” said Verstappen in a statement after the race.
However, it was an easy win for Lewis Hamilton, as he was at the pole position of the grid and with no drama at all, he continued his dominance till the end with a massive lead of 6 seconds over Vettel. The track certainly looked a lot dry than the earlier races, which meant a lot of risks were taken during the race.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel and his masterclass of overtaking was so ruthless that even his team mate Kimi Räikkönen got overtaken in the process.
After passing his team mate, Vettel went on to overtake his former team mate, Red Bulls Daniel Ricciardo. Next, on his list was Red Bulls another member, Max Verstappen who under a lot of pressure from Vettel who locked up his brakes to give himself a chance to continue his deadly streak. “I think I’ve passed nine cars on my first lap. It felt a little bit like a video game for me,” said Verstappen in a statement after the race.
As usual, McLaren is still solving their mechanical failures. Both, McLarens were pull off in the middle of the race due to some mechanical failures. William’s are too going through the same horrible phase as McLaren’s, as both their drivers lost their leads, Felipe Massa diving from seventh place to fourteenth and his team mate Stroll also lost from his tenth place. And what some people felt Déjà vu was that another crash by Antonio Giovinazzi as he loses the grip and crashed into the barriers.
At the upper end of the race, the competition between Vettel and Hamilton was much tense as the track was dry and both had chosen soft tyres. Hamilton is now sharing his leader board with Vettel but in the constructor’s championship board it’s the Germans who has the lead with just one point.
Now, the teams are packing their bags for the next stop in the calendar i.e. the Bahrain Grand Prix, next week.
(With inputs from www.formula1.com & Hindustan Times)