Nico Rosberg has finally got the better of Mercedes teammate lewis Hamilton this season, winning the Spanish Grand Prix from pole position on Sunday to gain ground on the championship leader. Hamilton finished in second place and Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel was third. The morale-boosting win was Rosberg’s ninth and his first since the Brazilian GP - the penultimate race of the last season — which the German also won from pole. Hamilton has won three of five races this season, with Vettel the only other driver to beat him when the German won the Malaysian GP in March.
Hamilton has finished in the top two for 12 straight races since retiring at last season’s Belgium GP in August. He leads Rosberg by 20 points and dominant Mercedes has finished 1-2 in three of five races so far. As Rosberg milked the applause, Hamilton walked up to him, patted him on the back and then shook his hand firmly. A gleeful Rosberg than jumped up and down with his Mercedes crew.
A crowd of 86,700 watched the race, with a total of 189,000 spectators attending the Catalunya circuit over the weekend — although there was no Spanish driver in genuine contention and little suspense, either. With 19 of the past 25 winners here starting from pole, the sinewy circuit is arguably the hardest to overtake on in F1 — and this showed as Rosberg finished 17.5 seconds clear of Hamilton and some 45.3 ahead of Vettel.
Although the 730-meter straight to the first turn offered Hamilton the chance to apply instant pressure, Rosberg got away well. Hamilton stuttered hampered by wheel spin as Vettel overtook him and he only just held off the Williams of Valtteri Bottas heading into the first corner. Bottas finished fourth and Raikkonen was fifth. Starting from seventh, Raikkonen got up fifth while teenager Verstappen and Felipe Massa overtook Carlos Sainz Jr., who started from a career-high fifth on the grid.
It wasn’t Hamilton’s day, as his first pit stop on lap 14 for a new set of medium tires took 5.3 seconds because a mechanic appeared not to get the left rear wheel on cleanly. Sensing an opportunity, Vettel’s team told him to come in straight away for his first stop which was an extremely fast 2.3 seconds. Alonso retired on the 28th lap because of brake problems, after overshooting his stop as he entered the pits, sending a front jack flying which thankfully did not hit the mechanic nearby.
Up ahead, nothing was troubling Rosberg as he extended his lead over Vettel to 10 seconds by halfway. Hamilton chose this moment to pit for the second time after 33 of 66 laps, switching to hard tires, and this change was better than the first, but still not very fast at 3.4 seconds. With about eight laps to go, Mercedes was trying to get Hamilton to consolidate his position, knowing Rosberg was too far ahead.
No points for Force India
Sahara Force India returned empty-handed for the third time this season in five races after Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg finished 13th and 15th respectively at the Spanish Grand Prix. The two Force India drivers were not in great grid positions as Hulkenberg had started 17th, just ahead of his Mexican teammate. Only at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix, the team enjoyed a double points finish.