Rosberg takes 4th win in Germany Hamilton comes from 20th to finish 3rd after 5 place grid penalty for gearbox change after smash. Rosberg extended his lead in the drivers championship to fourteen points after winning his home GP from pole position. The Williams team continued to show great strides forward with Valtterie Bottas finishing second for the second GP in a row but his teammate Brazilian Filipe Massa too finished his race in the same way as he did at the previous GP. Sadly, in an accident after being clipped by Kevin Magnussens McLaren on the first lap. All the more disappointing when you know its the third time this season hat has happened. The last time being at the British GP last weekend. Perhaps the drive of the day though was produced by Lewis Hamilton. After Saturdays 130mph smash in qualifying caused by a brake disc failure, Hamiltons team had a mammoth task to prepare his seriously damaged car in time for the race. It became apparent fairly quickly that the team were going to have to change gearboxes on the Mercedes engine which had suffered damage in the crash. This resulted in Hamilton whose crash in Q1 already meant he was starting in 15th was dealt another blow with a 5 place penalty for the gearbox change. Setting off from 20th position on the grid the former champion sliced through the field like the proverbial hot knife, frequently using the hairpin to make his passes. The hairpin is situated more or less at the point where the track used to make the return into the stadium section from the ultra high speed forest sections. With Hamilton having to make some close passing moves early as he moved through the field and came across the drivers in faster cars the passing became even closer and there was noticeable contact between he and both Kimi Raikkonen in te Ferrari and former teammate and fellow Brit Jenson Button. In the latter pass the Mercedes wing was damaged and that forced the Silver Arrows team into moving from their originally planned two stops to a three stop strategy. Whilst only able to finish in third , Hamilton took the fastest lap and By the time the race had reached lap 61 of 67 Hamilton was in third place but his hard charging and the extra pit stop meant he was struggling to get past Bottas. It would be doing a great disservice to the Williams team and to Valtterie Bottas not to point out that the car and the driver BOTH impressed all weekend with outstanding pace in what appears to be a thoroughly rejuvenated Williams team. Elsewhere whilst Hamilton was flying and demonstrating both his skill and the works Mercedes power advantage, other teams were shuffling the pack nicely and Alonso was involved with a long battle between his Ferrari and both Red Bulls. Reigning champ Seb Vettel was able to hold off Alonso and take fourth with teammate Ricciardo coming in 6th leaving the Ferrari the filling in the Red Bull sandwich.
Posted on: Mon, 21 Jul 2014 01:43:39 +0000
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