[ad_1]
Lewis Hamilton won a place in history with the victory in the 2019 Chinese Grand Prix, the 1,000th race of the Formula 1 World Championship since its inception in 1950.
This is Hamilton's sixth win in Shanghai and his 75th career victory in F1. He managed to reach the finish with more than six seconds ahead of his teammate Mercedes, Valtteri Bottas, who had lost pole after a slow start to the race and had never had the opportunity to recover.
Sebastian Vettel also lost a place at the start, but Ferrari's strategy allowed him to return to Charles Leclerc and the young driver lost fourth place ahead of Max Verstappen of Red Bull.
The conditions were cool, cloudy and windy as the cars headed to the starting grid on Sunday afternoon. The top ten went to the grid in formation two by two with Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton, of Mercedes, leading their respective counterparts: Ferrari, Red Bull, Renault and Haas. However, Max Verstappen nearly spoiled the situation by completing a formation lap, while Robert Kubica Williams followed in the same direction while the drivers were trying to heat their tires in time for the start.
When the lights went out, Hamilton had the advantage of taking pole position, while Charles Leclerc had the advantage of taking third place ahead of Sebastian Vettel, ahead of Verstappen, Pierre Gasly and Daniel Ricciardo, with Racing Point. Sergio Perez who pbades Nico Hulkenberg and the two cars Haas for an eighth place out of 12 in the standings.
While the start was clean up front, there were further problems when Daniil Kvyat's Toro Rosso subdirected the two McLarens to Turn 6, setting off a brief safety car while the way picked up the debris. All those involved were able to continue, although both McLaren had to make repairs, although Lando Norris was informed of the ground damage to his MCL34 when contact briefly flung him into the air. Kvyat joined them at the back after being seen inflicting a camber penalty for causing the collision. The damage suffered by the car eventually forced him to abandon the race on the 44th lap.
When the race resumes, Hamilton quickly gets out of the DRS range. Vettel was closer to his team mate after the Monegasque stuck at the pin on lap 7, but he was still unable to use the DRS boost to challenge the slower Leclerc in third place. Finally, Ferrari's pit wall intervened with the clear instruction "Let Sebastian by", which the young man did although not without some protests. Leclerc then put forward his point of view by sticking to the back of Vettel, who was now suffering from large blockages as he tried to reduce the gap between the two. Silver Arrows cars to the front.
Alfa Romeo – the winning team of the very first F1 Grand Prix long ago – was the first to make a pit stop, with Antonio Giovinazzi in the eighth lap to go from rubber to mediums. Haas was the next to act, Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen both choosing to take the difficult compound, which clearly indicated that they were planning to run the rest of the race without further stopping. When Renault reacted, a slow stop for Hulkenberg put it back on the track in the 16th Haas pair, but the question became questionable when the RS19 returned to the pit lane on the 17th lap with a problem that forced Hulkenberg to retire.
With a five-second lead at the front of the pack, Hamilton took a new step in F1 by becoming the second driver (after Michael Schumacher) to lead more than 4000 Grand Prix laps. He did not feel the need to react to Verstappen's pulling holes in lap seven, but Ferrari coached Vettel next time and had just managed to get the four-time champion back on the track before Verstappen put everything in place at the end. turn 14 after the turn. Vettel was momentarily held by Norris. The two men were walking in hairpin bows, but there was no contact and Vettel was holding on.
Ricciardo opposed the only remaining Renault on the 19th lap and the Mercedes was finally called to fight for Bottas on the 22nd lap. With hard tires, the Finn returned to the track just ahead of Vettel. Hamilton stood out of his head next time. Leclerc finished the sequence on lap 23 and found himself behind Verstappen at the time of his return, which only added to the growing frustration that his race strategy had been a secondary consideration until now. with regard to the team.
Hamilton was also unhappy with the way the pit stops had unfolded, which had erased his first lead, so Bottas held a prominent position in his mirrors. As the race approached mid-race, Vettel was eight seconds behind, followed by Verstappen, Leclerc, Gasly, Ricciardo, Perez and Grosjean. Alfa Romeo's Kimi Raikkonen was tenth after stopping. Subsequently, Raikkonen made his turn on lap 14 of Grosjean on lap 30 and was able to repel the French counter-attack on lap 1 to maintain the newly acquired ninth place.
As the race progressed to the static state, the big question was whether everyone would arrive at the finish without changing tires, with Plan B of the Ferrari booth wall for Leclerc on the radio. team, while he was the fastest man driver on the right track. This allusion forced Red Bull to take preemptive action on lap 35 against Verstappen against new mediums, prompting Ferrari to move into action – although Vettel was in the group on lap 36 rather than Leclerc. This time, Vettel was well ahead of the Red Bull when he came back and he did not repeat his previous wheel to wheel meeting.
Dominoes continued to fall and Mercedes and Hamilton dropped Hamilton and Bottas on lap 37. In a perfectly executed double stacking maneuver, Hamilton emerged in front of Leclerc, who remains to match, Bottas siding behind the Ferrari and comfortably ahead of Vettel. Verstappen, Gasly and Ricciardo. All hopes that Leclerc's "Plan B" was in fact offside quickly faded away when he fell to within three seconds of the pace of those around him and his main contribution was to delay Bottas. before the inevitable defeat. 39. Two laps later, he was overtaken and overtaken by his teammate, after which he underwent a slow refueling that brought him back to fifth place behind Verstappen.
The teams having launched their strategic dice for the day, it was only necessary to bring the cars home without any other incident. Although the engine lost ground to protect the engine, Hamilton's lead on the line through Bottas had gone to six and a half seconds.
Vettel made his first podium of the season ahead of Verstappen. Leclerc failed to stand out significantly in the advantage of the Dutch driver in the closing laps. Gasly followed in sixth position with a late move to soft tires in a successful pursuit of the point for a better lap, while Ricciardo finally scored his first points for the new Renault team with a solid seventh place ahead of Perez and Raikkonen.
The best afternoon training is undoubtedly that of Alexander Albon, who started the race after the pit lane in a rebuilt Toro Rosso after his heavy accident in FP3 having forced him to miss the qualifications. Getting a point at the end of such a steamy period was rather a rather brilliant achievement. This meant that neither Grosjean's Haas nor Magnussen were among the top ten.
Lance Stroll of Racing Point was also absent in Shanghai, while Sainz beat Giovinazzi in thirteenth place. Once again, the two Williams cars, George Russell and Robert Kubica, lined up behind, under the checkered flag. Norris retired in the final laps to join Kvyat and Hulkenberg on the sidelines.
Gallery: The beautiful brides and friends of F1 drivers
Stay up-to-date with all F1 news via Facebook and Twitter
[ad_2]
Source link
