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Formula 1 British Grand Prix 2017

Lewis Hamilton Celebrates With His Fans After Winning British Grand Prix

Lewis Hamilton claimed his fifth British Grand Prix win, his fourth in a row leading Valtteri Bottas home in a Mercedes 1-2 finish. While it all unraveled for Ferrari with both drivers suffering front left tire failures in the closing two laps, despite this, Kimi Raikkonen still managed to finish on the podium for Maranello.

After the first start was aborted due to Jolyon Palmer stopping on the formation lap, the race got started in anger on lap 2 with Lewis Hamilton leading into turn 1 while Ferarri’s Sebastian Vettel made a poor start allowing Max Verstappen to move upto 3rd spot by turn 1, only to get balked by Raikkonen allowing Vettel to retake 3rd, but Verstappen hung in there to claim back the podium spot around the outside of turn 4.

Also on the first racing lap, the Toro Rosso drivers came together in the Maggots, Becketts, chapel complex, immediately ending Carlos Sainz’ race. Danill Kvyat recovered to the pits and continued but was later handed a drive-thru penalty for rejoining the track in an unsafe manner, which caused the Toro Rosso’s to collide, ultimately destroying both drivers chances and brought out the safety car.

With a third of the race completed, Vettel made an attempt to pass Verstappen into Stowe at the end of the Hanger Straight, once again, Verstappen doggedly hung in there, both drivers leaving the track confines, battling side by side into Vale and Club, where Verstappen had the inside line pushing Vettel wide to retain his 3rd place, which triggered Ferrari into pitting Vettel for the undercut on the Dutchman.

The undercut worked brilliantly for Vettel and Ferrari, despite Red Bull pitting Verstappen the next lap in response, a momentarily misaligned wheel nut caused Verstappen vital seconds allowing Vettel to take third place. Meanwhile, Verstappen’s team mate Daniel Ricciardo had made his way upto 8th place after starting from 19th place due to turbo failure during qualifying 1 and subsequent MGU-H change.

After the usual mid-race lull in action, the last 10 laps saw Bottas catch and overtake Ferrari’s Vettel and Raikkonen thanks to his super soft tires, which he found himself on after starting on the harder ‘soft’ tires as part of his Mercedes team strategy after serving a five place grid penalty for changing his gearbox.

During laps 50 and 51, Ferrari’s race imploded with both drivers suffering a front left tire failure, which dropped Vettel all the way back to seventh from fourth place, while Raikkonen recovered to third place as his tire failure was not quite as bad as Vettel suffered. Verstappen, Ricciardo and Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg all moved up one position to fourth, fifth and sixth respectively thanks to Vettel’s misfortune.

Ferrari’s tire issues have cost them big time, Sebastian Vettel’s drivers championship lead has been cut to just one point and Ferrari have fallen 55 points behind Mercedes in the constructors championship. Could this be the turning point of the season, will Ferrari fall away while we see a Mercedes resurgence? I hope that is not the case, I hope Ferrari can come back after this setback to keep Mercedes on their toes.

British Grand Prix 2017 Results

1. Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) 1:21:27.430
2. Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes) +14.063
3. Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari) +36.570
4. Max Verstapopen (Red Bull) +52.125
5. Daniel Ricciardo (Red Bull) +65.955
6. Nico Hulkenberg (Renault) +68.109
7. Sebastian Vettel (Ferrari) +93.989
8. Esteban Ocon (Force India) +1 LAP
9. Sergio Perez (Force India) +1 LAP
10. Felipe Massa (Williams) +1 LAP

Going back one day, it could’ve been very different if the FIA had taken action against Hamilton for blocking HAAS’ Romain Grosjean. The weak FIA have made, in my opinion, a bunch of political decisions in recent weeks to not affect the drivers title race. If rules are not to be applied fairly, then let’s just abandon rules and have anarchy on the track, in my mind, the FIA’s credibility is at an all time low.

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