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Versthaben was at the forefront of the race and managed to defend his position against Hamilton's attacks during the first half of the race, but Mercedes had the advantage of turning the table in front of Red Bull asking Hamilton for an extra stop.
The British made the second stop on the 49th lap when he switched to medium tires. At 18 seconds from Verstauben before 20 laps, the British managed to reduce roll after rollover.
The British did not trust the strategy at first, but gave him the lead at the expense of Verstauben, especially when he managed early in turn 67 to climb to the top after going to Verstapen on the first corner . The latter went directly to the maintenance area to change his tires, which complicated the task of finishing the race with the old group.
This is Hamilton's 81st win and his eighth win this season. He won his seventh win at the Hangaroring circuit.
On the other hand, Sebastian Vettel was third with two draws from the end after defeating his team-mate Charles Leclair, but Ferrari's performance was disappointing while the difference between Hamilton and Fettel was 61 seconds.
Carlos Sainz took fifth place against Pierre Gasley and Kimi Raikkonen.
Valteri Potas, who dropped to the last position after being stopped in the first round because the front wing was hit, ended the race in eighth place.
Lando Norris and Alexander Albon finished in the top ten.
The race
Verstauben managed to get a good start to keep his lead while Botas lost second place and slipped behind Hamilton and Leclerc, where he was damaged in the front wing of his car. The Finn was forced to enter the maintenance zone, change his tires and return to the race in the last place on the "Hard" tires.
Verstauben was only two seconds from Hamilton and there was only 10 seconds left. At the same time, Potas was trying to climb to 16th on lap 15.
Ferrari was third and fourth with Leclair and Fettel, but they were both slower on a second lap at both Verchtapen and Hamilton. The Dutchman told his team that he had begun to lose consistency with Hamilton's approach.
But the Red Bull driver stopped on the 26th lap for the "hard" tires, where Mercedes asked his Hamilton driver to put pressure under Hammerheim.
But Hamilton's pace was not fast at that time, it was about 0.4 seconds slower than Verstapen, while the difference was 18.4 seconds, with Verstaben's exit from the maintenance zone being reduced to 16.8 seconds over 4 turns. The difference increases gradually, one by one.
On lap 32, Hamilton stopped and switched to hard tires to take a 6-second lead over Verstetten and Vettel by 8.8 seconds.
But the British quickly reduced the gap to 2.4 seconds in the 34th lap before falling to 1.2 seconds. The two men embarked on a great battle from the 35th lap. The British presence was only half a second.
Hamilton attempted to overtake the 39th lap, but he came off the track and brought the gap back to one second before moving to 1.7 seconds in the next lap.
Meanwhile, Vettel stopped but the mechanical team was slow to change tires due to a fault in the right front tire attachment.
But the Mercedes team surprised everyone by stopping Hamilton for extra time on the 49th lap as he switched to "medium" tires to try to make quick laps. The British managed to narrow the gap one after another to 11 seconds, with 10 laps to go at the end of the race.
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