(Mercedes AMG F1 Team)
Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team's Lewis Hamilton recovered from a disappointing race last time out at the Belgian Grand Prix two weeks ago to take victory in today's Italian Grand Prix to lead team mate and championship leader Nico Rosberg home for a team 1-2 to extend their lead in the Constructors championship to 182 points over reigning world champions Infiniti Red Bull Racing.
The Williams Martini Racing Team had a fantastic race. After starting the race from third and fourth on the grid Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas finished the race in third and fourth place. For Massa it was a great result for the Brazilian as he claimed his first podium finish for the Grove based outfit at the home race of his former team Ferrari.
The Grove based outfit have now moved ahead of Ferrari into third place in the Constructors championship, 15 points ahead of the Italian team.
Infiniti Red Bull Racing's Daniel Ricciardo had a fantastic race having qualified in 9th place the Australian drove extremely well to finish the race in fifth place just ahead of team mate and reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel who finished in 6th place. Speaking following the race Daniel Ricciardo commented:
'The strategy helped today, it kept the tyres fresh enough to go those extra few laps at the end. I saw the cars in front of me pit and the pace was still good enough, so seeing that we didn’t have great pace when we were out of position then we thought we would try something different and that’s why we went long, which helped towards the end of the race. I was more comfortable with the prime tyre and was able to do some good moves, which kept me smiling.
The start wasn’t ideal, it’s one of the longest runs up to Turn One here from the start line and it’s not a place where you want to have a bad one, but I dropped the clutch and didn’t get the traction, so we will have to look at that, but we kept a cool head and picked our way back through the field. I think fifth, even with a good start, was the best we could do.'
Reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel said:
'I think that was the most we could do today. On the primes we weren’t able to look after the tyres as well as we wanted to.
The target is to get back to the front, at the moment the gap is quite big but we will have to work hard to close it again. We have had some difficulties this year, but they can only make us stronger if we learn from them. In terms of strategy we wanted to get the McLarens so we went aggressive with the early stop, but the tyres started going off at the end and all in all that was what we could do today.'
Infiniti Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner was happy with the team performance but feels that the reigning world champions will be in a position to challenge for victory at the next two fly away races in Singapore and Japan:
'I think fifth and sixth was the absolute optimum today. We picked two different strategies, an aggressive one with Sebastian to undercut the McLaren, which worked and gave him track position but unfortunately made his tyres marginal at the end of the race.
With Daniel we took the opposite approach as he was running in clear air. We ran him long in the first stint with a shorter second stint and then his passing moves to come back through the field were truly impressive and obviously with Sebastian struggling with tyre degradation due to the length of the stint, it became inevitable that the two were going to swap positions. But fifth and sixth place, at a circuit dominated by Mercedes-powered cars, is damage limitation achieved.'
'The strategy helped today, it kept the tyres fresh enough to go those extra few laps at the end. I saw the cars in front of me pit and the pace was still good enough, so seeing that we didn’t have great pace when we were out of position then we thought we would try something different and that’s why we went long, which helped towards the end of the race. I was more comfortable with the prime tyre and was able to do some good moves, which kept me smiling.
The start wasn’t ideal, it’s one of the longest runs up to Turn One here from the start line and it’s not a place where you want to have a bad one, but I dropped the clutch and didn’t get the traction, so we will have to look at that, but we kept a cool head and picked our way back through the field. I think fifth, even with a good start, was the best we could do.'
Reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel said:
'I think that was the most we could do today. On the primes we weren’t able to look after the tyres as well as we wanted to.
The target is to get back to the front, at the moment the gap is quite big but we will have to work hard to close it again. We have had some difficulties this year, but they can only make us stronger if we learn from them. In terms of strategy we wanted to get the McLarens so we went aggressive with the early stop, but the tyres started going off at the end and all in all that was what we could do today.'
Infiniti Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner was happy with the team performance but feels that the reigning world champions will be in a position to challenge for victory at the next two fly away races in Singapore and Japan:
'I think fifth and sixth was the absolute optimum today. We picked two different strategies, an aggressive one with Sebastian to undercut the McLaren, which worked and gave him track position but unfortunately made his tyres marginal at the end of the race.
With Daniel we took the opposite approach as he was running in clear air. We ran him long in the first stint with a shorter second stint and then his passing moves to come back through the field were truly impressive and obviously with Sebastian struggling with tyre degradation due to the length of the stint, it became inevitable that the two were going to swap positions. But fifth and sixth place, at a circuit dominated by Mercedes-powered cars, is damage limitation achieved.'
Sahara Force India's Sergio Perez did a great job for the Silverstone based outfit as he managed to the end the race in 7th place. The Mexican had a fantastic battle with former McLaren team mate Jenson Button with the pair racing wheel to wheel with Perez winning that particular battle. Following the race Perez commented:
'The race was a lot of fun. We were always fighting somebody and always pushing hard. It was great racing and it’s good to score important points for the championship. The most important part of the race was the fight I had with Jenson, which was really nice and reminded me of the old days. I know he is a driver that you can fight really hard and it’s always clean.
At the end of the race with Kevin, I knew he had a penalty and there was no need to attack him. It meant I could focus on keeping Jenson behind me, which was not easy.'
'The race was a lot of fun. We were always fighting somebody and always pushing hard. It was great racing and it’s good to score important points for the championship. The most important part of the race was the fight I had with Jenson, which was really nice and reminded me of the old days. I know he is a driver that you can fight really hard and it’s always clean.
At the end of the race with Kevin, I knew he had a penalty and there was no need to attack him. It meant I could focus on keeping Jenson behind me, which was not easy.'
It was disappointing race for Ferrari and Kimi Raikkonen. The Finn had a difficult qualifying session yesterday and started today's race from eleventh place and finished the race in 9th place while team mate Fernando Alonso suffered his first retirement as a Ferrari driver following a failure with his Energy Recovery System.
McLaren's Kevin Magnussen finished the race in 10th place after being handed a five second penalty after colliding with the Williams Martini Racing car of Valtteri Bottas.
Daniil Kvyat recovered from a brake duct failure to finish the race in eleventh place for the Toro Rosso team.
Sahara Force India's Nico Hulkenberg was left disappointed after finishing the race just outside the points for the Silverstone based team in 12th place. Speaking after the race the German said:
'It wasn't a very busy race for me. I was racing alone most of the time and just doing my own race: not being towed around or benefiting from DRS made it a bit harder.
I had a very good start, especially considering I was on the hard tyre, but I lost contact with the cars ahead of me quite soon because they were on the medium and I didn’t really have the same pace. It was quite difficult to manage the car, especially the rear end: I had some oversteering and it was tricky to drive.
I pitted quite early as I wasn't going anywhere on my hard tyres and we saw a good opportunity to jump people, but we still found it difficult to deal with the balance. We need to look ahead now to Singapore and work to bring more performance to the car. Singapore is a track we all enjoy: everything - the track, the atmosphere, the setup - is special.'
Sahara Force India F1 Team principal and managing director Dr Vijay Mallya commented:
'Six points keeps us where we need to be in our close championship battle with just a single point separating us from fifth place.
Sergio was mighty today, showing once again how well he can race with some brilliant overtaking and defending. Nico made a great start, but he has not been completely comfortable with the car balance all weekend and especially in the race today. Despite his very strong start, points were out of reach. With six races remaining this season, I still believe we have all to play for and that we must keep pushing hard.'
Jean Eric Vergne finished the race in 13th place while the Lotus F1 Team's Pastor Maldonado finished the race in 14th place.
'It wasn't a very busy race for me. I was racing alone most of the time and just doing my own race: not being towed around or benefiting from DRS made it a bit harder.
I had a very good start, especially considering I was on the hard tyre, but I lost contact with the cars ahead of me quite soon because they were on the medium and I didn’t really have the same pace. It was quite difficult to manage the car, especially the rear end: I had some oversteering and it was tricky to drive.
I pitted quite early as I wasn't going anywhere on my hard tyres and we saw a good opportunity to jump people, but we still found it difficult to deal with the balance. We need to look ahead now to Singapore and work to bring more performance to the car. Singapore is a track we all enjoy: everything - the track, the atmosphere, the setup - is special.'
Sahara Force India F1 Team principal and managing director Dr Vijay Mallya commented:
'Six points keeps us where we need to be in our close championship battle with just a single point separating us from fifth place.
Sergio was mighty today, showing once again how well he can race with some brilliant overtaking and defending. Nico made a great start, but he has not been completely comfortable with the car balance all weekend and especially in the race today. Despite his very strong start, points were out of reach. With six races remaining this season, I still believe we have all to play for and that we must keep pushing hard.'
Jean Eric Vergne finished the race in 13th place while the Lotus F1 Team's Pastor Maldonado finished the race in 14th place.
The Sauber F1 Team are still chancing the first championship points of the season following another tough weekend for the Swiss outfit as Adrian Sutil finished the race in 15th place. The German said:
Romain Grosjean finished the race in 16th place following another disappointing race for the Enstone based outfit.
Kamui Kobayashi finished as the best of the 'new teams' on his return to the cockpit this weekend the Japanese driver ended the race in 17th place for the Caterham F1 Team finishing the race just ahead of the Marussia F1 Team's Jules Bianchi.
The Sauber F1 Team's Esteban Gutierrez finished the race in 19th place just ahead of the Caterham F1 Team's Marcus Ericsson.
There were two retirements as Ferrari's Fernando Alonso was joined on the sidelines by the Marussia F1 Team's Max Chilton.
Drivers Championship
1 Nico Rosberg Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team 238 Points
2 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team 216
3 Daniel Ricciardo Infiniti Red Bull Racing 166
4 Valtteri Bottas Williams Martini Racing Team 122
5 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 121
6 Sebastian Vettel Infiniti Red Bull Racing 106
7 Jenson Button McLaren Mercedes 72
8 Nico Hulkenberg Sahara Force India F1 Team 70
9 Felipe Massa Williams Martini Racing Team 55
10 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 41
11 Sergio Perez Sahara Force India F1 Team 39
12 Kevin Magnussen McLaren Mercedes 38
13 Jean Eric Vergne Toro Rosso 11
14 Romain Grosjean Lotus F1 Team 8
15 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 8
16 Jules Bianchi Marussia F1 Team 2
Constructor Championship
1 Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team 454 Points
2 Infiniti Red Bull Racing 272
3 Williams Martini Racing Team 177
4 Ferrari 162
5 McLaren Mercedes 110
6 Sahara Force India F1 Team 109
7 Scuderia Toro Rosso 19
8 Lotus F1 Team 8
9 Marussia F1 Team 2
10 Sauber F1 Team 0
11 Caterham F1 Team 0
© Ben Johnston 2014
No comments:
Post a Comment