SOCHI, Russia – Lewis Hamilton led a shocking one-two finish for Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport during Sunday’s VTB Russian Grand Prix, after a dominant first half by Scuderia Ferrari unraveled itself in one fell swoop.
Ferrari had appeared to have the advantage over the Silver Arrows all weekend long, and that pace continued for the early stages of the 16th race of the Formula One season.
Sebastian Vettel led the first 25 laps of the race off a monstrous start at Sochi Autodrom, which saw him leapfrog both Hamilton and polesitter Charles Leclerc before the field ever reached turn one.
Despite the Scuderia having a plan to get Leclerc back out front, however, Vettel put his foot to the floor and opened up as much as a four-second lead over his teammate in order to maintain his place as the faster of the two team drivers.
Leclerc pitted for fresh tires on lap 23 and ripped off a sequence of fastest laps that was enough to allow him to leapfrog Vettel when the latter made his pit stop four circuits later, but Vettel lost power on his Ferrari barely a lap after exiting the pit lane.
As the German pulled to a heart-wrenching stop in the turn-15 runoff area, the victim of an MGU-K problem, a virtual safety car period on the 28th lap allowed both Mercedes drivers – Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas – to steal a free pit stop for fresh medium compound tires.
Hamilton rejoined with a lead he wouldn’t relinquish, while Bottas came out behind Leclerc in third, just before a full safety car was called for the stricken Williams of George Russell, which lost brakes and ended up stuck in the tire barriers.
At that point, Leclerc pitted for a fresh set of soft-compound tires, dropping back behind Bottas but hopeful of being able to re-pass him and mount a charge at Hamilton.
From there, racing resumed for good with 21 laps left in the 53-lap affair, but try as he might Leclerc could never get close enough to Bottas to be able to get back to second.
That left Hamilton unchallenged out front, cruising to his ninth win of the season and the 82nd of his Formula One career, just nine behind Michael Schumacher’s all-time record.
It was also the sixth win in six runnings of the Russian Grand Prix for Mercedes, extending their unbeaten streak at Sochi Autodrom since the course was added to the F-1 schedule in 2014.
“This win feels like it has been a long time coming. It was just an incredible job from the whole team: never giving up, pushing forward, always trying to be innovative,” said Hamilton. “It’s incredibly inspiring to be part of that and amazing to have this result today, considering how quick the Ferraris were in that opening stint. It was a really hard task to keep up with them, especially on the offset tire (compound), but we kept pushing and the car felt really good today.
“We thought that their soft tires would drop off during that opening stint, but they had such good pace that I was struggling to keep up with them – and that’s probably a little warning for us, because it looked like they got their calculations right in that regard,” Hamilton continued. “I managed to stay within shouting distance, though, and started closing down the gap as their tires started to drop. Charles pitted, then I started catching Seb, and we were in a good position to offset and go long – even had the safety car not come out. … Then everything fell our way, and after that it was a question of building the gap, saving the tires and getting to the finish as smoothly as possible.”
Bottas fended off every advance Leclerc made to finish second, giving Mercedes their fourth top-two sweep in six tries in Sochi, with Leclerc crossing third.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was a distant fourth, while his teammate Alexander Albon rallied from a pit-lane start due to power unit penalties to complete the top five finishers.
McLaren’s Carlos Sainz, Racing Point’s Sergio Perez, the sister McLaren of Lando Norris, Haas F1’s Kevin Magnussen and Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg filled out the points scorers.
Though Ferrari appears to have found an edge against the Mercedes duo, Hamilton is relishing the challenge as the stretch run continues to wind down the F-1 season.
“When you have a battle like this, you’re working flat out, turning over every stone and questioning every little thing you can do better,” he noted. “We love that challenge and I’m really excited for the next few races.”
The finish:
Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas, Charles Leclerc, Max Verstappen, Alexander Albon, Carlos Sainz, Sergio Perez, Lando Norris, Kevin Magnussen, Nico Hulkenberg, Â