Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, Silverstone, 2019

Hamilton takes record sixth home win in thrilling British GP

2019 British Grand Prix summary

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Lewis Hamilton scored a record-breaking sixth British Grand Prix victory in an action-packed race.

The Mercedes driver got ahead of team mate Valtteri Bottas thanks to a mid-race Safety Car period triggered by Antonio Giovinazzi. Bottas resisted a had already pitted to cover off the threat from the cars behind him but Hamilton, running longer, was able to save time by pitting during the Safety Car period and came out ahead of his team mate.

Charles Leclerc finished third despite also losing out during the Safety Car period and falling to sixth. He claimed the final podium position by passing Pierre Gasly, and benefited from a controversial collision between their team mates.

Max Verstappen brought his damaged Red Bull home in fifth place after being hit from behind by Sebastian Vettel approaching Vale. The Ferrari driver had been trying to get down the inside but found his way blocked by Verstappen. Vettel was given a 10-second time penalty but finished outside the points anyway.

The midfield battle was also shaped by the mid-race Safety Car. Carlos Sainz Jnr benefited and claimed sixth place but his team mate Lando Norris, who pitted earlier, was unhappy with his strategy and dropped to 12th.

Daniel Ricciardo, Kimi Raikkonen and the Toro Rosso pair of Daniil Kvyat and Alexander Albon claimed the final points places. Nico Hulkenberg, 11th, was knocked wide by Sergio Perez after the restart, the Racing Point driver damaging his car’s front wing.

The Haas drivers made contact on the first lap of the race and had to pit for fresh tyres, dropping them to the back of the field.

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2019 British Grand Prix reaction

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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112 comments on “Hamilton takes record sixth home win in thrilling British GP”

  1. Hopefully, Gasly can keep this form for the remainder of the season, i.e., hopefully, this wasn’t just a one-off.

    1. Good weekend from Pierre, yes. And a great overtake on Vettel too. Great to see and I also hope he keeps it up. Very likable kid.

  2. Was thinking, if HAAS couldn’t take Rich Energy off their livery for whatever reason this weekend, wouldn’t be much better way to punish them than not giving them the TV time.

    Anyway great race, really thrilling stuff. Something about Silverstone and the regulations had these cars working nicely to provide some great racing. Hopefully that can be replicated in races to come! Truly excellent.

    1. I think, for whatever reason, rich energy sounds like they are trying to severe the relationship, to get off the contract, but hass playing it safe to not give an inch to rich, i wonder if rich energy paid all their dues already or installments? because they sound like they want out of the contract/payments… i feel rich energy about to explode…

    2. Re. Rich Energy: here’s one sarcastic tweet by Storey: https://twitter.com/rich_energy/status/1150395070409007104

      On a more serious note, the sponsorship amount appears to have been roughly £15 million per year: https://twitter.com/rich_energy/status/1150439445289734144

  3. Miltiadis (@miltosgreekfan)
    14th July 2019, 15:51

    The race was really really good and its obvious that the new regulations do have a big effect when following a car. Following drivers are able to stay within 0.5 of the leading car which is great. Unfortunately the strategy that Mercedes followed screwed Bottas who was really strong the whole weekend.
    The battle between Leclerc and Verstappen was intense and it became instant highlight. Great to see Gasly performing, while on the other hand the whole pace and driving of Vettel indicate that he is really considering retiring from the sport

    1. I thought it was the safety car that lost Bottas the race.
      The strategy was on point.

      1. Absolutely agree, race was gifted deliberately to H by F1 and very dodgy decision to use SC and not VSC.

        1. @spartan2000 Economy packs of tinfoil aside, Hamilton would have gone onto hard tyres and won the race anyhow. The better question is: why was Bottas unable to challenge HAM even on medium tyres after the SC restart and how was HAM able to set fastest lap on 30-lap hard tyres versus BOT on soft tyres? Same answer as to why HAM was all over Bottas in the first part of the race, he was faster in the race.

          1. He indeed was all over Bottas, until Bottas defeated him fair and square.
            It wad the SC that saved the day for Lewis.

          2. @david-br I was expecting Mercedes to pit Hamilton one lap after Bottas, but they didn’t. As tire degradation was fairly low, the 1-stop strategy turned out to be the winning strategy, so I don’t know why Mercedes pitted Bottas that early. Even without the safety car he was very likely to lose the race.

          3. erikje I wouldn’t call destroying your tyres and having to go on a 2 stop defeating anyone. As soon as Bottas pitted he had effectively lost the race and that was before the safety car.

          4. @f1infigures Bottas knew and agreed pre-race to the second driver running a MHM strategy. What he (they) didn’t know was that the second driver – Hamilton in this case – would be able to do a MH one-stop. Hamilton’s tyre management has been better in general and the pace on the hard tyre also meant he was safe from Bottas getting past him on mediums.

            @erikje The point I was making was Hamilton’s pace advantage all race. Yes Bottas defended superbly. But he was unable to mount any challenge on HAM once the latter was past, despite being on nominally quicker tyres. Or set the fastest lap. So whether Bottas could have held back Hamilton on any strategy is highly debatable.

          5. @david-br Thanks for the explanation. Still I’m a bit puzzled by how both Pirelli and Mercedes could get their tire predictions so wrong. When looking at the data it seems that most drivers were constantly improving their lap times, which seems to suggest there was very little tire degradation; a point proven by Hamilton’s fastest lap. So the strategies were dictated by physical tire wear, which turned out to be not very high, and probably lower than expected as well.

          6. William Jones
            14th July 2019, 22:34

            @f1infigures The weather was unexpectedly cool, that’s probably a large part of the miscalculation!

          7. @f1infigures I guess that mismatch between expected wear and the actual race was mostly down to the new surface being difficult to predict?

        2. very dodgy decision to use SC and not VSC

          It’s hard to take you seriously since under VSC Hamilton would have still come out Infront of Bottas. In fact a VSC would have been better for Hamilton as Bottas wouldn’t have been able to catch up for free behind the SC.

          The only conclusion we can draw is you have no idea what you are talking about and your opinion on the matter does not merit consideration. Have a nice day :)

          1. +1 Hamilton was about 10 seconds ahead after emerging from the pits. Not sure, to be honest, what the lap time difference would be between a SC and VSC, but Hamilton would definitely have just been further ahead under the latter.

        3. Hamilton would have still came out first even if they used a vsc

          1. NeverElectric
            14th July 2019, 20:40

            Bottas was already committed to a 2-stopper before the SC. Hamilton, as we now know, was going for a 1-stop (against the team’s wishes, it would seem).
            Hamilton would have beaten Bottas regardless of the SC / VSC etc.
            Incredible that Hamilton was able to get the fastest lap at the end of the race on tyres that were 32 laps old – and that Bottas was not able to eat into Lewis’ lead despite Bottas having medium tyres on – new, too.

        4. Dodgy decision?

          Please tell me, what happened the last time they used yellow flags or vsc when there was a crane in the gravel trap? Crane near the track = safety car. Full stop.

    2. If you read the article below this one you will see: “Valtteri Bottas says his choice of tyre at his first pit stop was a “mistake” because it locked him into a two-stop strategy“. [my emphasis]

    3. Why do people keep saying Gasly was performing when even after VES had a damaged car from Vettel’s punt VES was still closing in on his teammate?

    4. Miltiadis (@miltosgreekfan)
      14th July 2019, 22:27

      It was kinda surprising to see Mercedes going for the first pit stop that early, especially since there wasnt any significant drop off. As it seems this was their initial plan, but my point of saying that Bottas wasn’t treated correctly strategy wise was that they allowed Hamilton to stay out for much more laps and didnt bring him after a couple of laps. This is an unwritten rule when the guys from the same team arebracing themselves- you follow the X strategy for the leading driver and the following one must follow a similar one. I don’t think that Bottas tyres were damaged/degraded, they just followed their initial plan for a two stopper but they didn’t follow a similar one for Hamilton. It was unfortunate coz in their 2.5 years as teammates , it was the first time that they battled on track for a big amount of time, and they both did a great show and respected the other

  4. High speed corners do allow cars to follow better.

    1. And the tires are much improved

  5. Panagiotis Papatheodorou (@panagiotism-papatheodorou)
    14th July 2019, 15:55

    Seb is a really cool dude, he even went and apologized to Max right after the race, in parc ferme. But this is just embarrassing by him. Leclerc had great racecraft today yet he couldn’t handle two corners against Max.

    1. @panagiotism-papatheodorou
      Didn’t see this, but good to know he has accepted blame and apologised.

      1. Yeah, it was very decent of him going to apologize to max today.

    2. It’s good to see the new kids performing at this level, hopefully a few more of this caliber come along and we can have a new golden age.

      Vettel is a sad sight at the moment.

      1. @flig We do have a few more drivers who could very well be future world champions in Norris and Russell, but the only problem is if they can ever get into a top car. I have my doubts about McLaren competing at the front for some time, and Russell just doesn’t have any space at Mercedes. Unfortunately for him, he’s likely to be stuck at Williams for some time yet. But I rate both Russell and Norris very close to the level of Verstappen and Leclerc. Currently, though, I don’t particularly see anyone in the junior formulas who has the potential to be a special star of the future, in the same way, that Ocon, Verstappen, Russell, and Leclerc showed in the past few seasons. Shwartzman looks decent so far, but there is still a lot more he has to prove.

    3. sounds like vettel is looking for retiring… i dont remember him apologizing like this ever, nor accepting any fault! like in the race chat he sort of complained/blamed max!

      1. GtisBetter (@)
        14th July 2019, 16:16

        He has done it multiple times

      2. It’s just the heat of the moment.
        You know what you want to do, the other guy doesn’t do exactly what you want him to, so you blame him in the moment. Anyone would do it, but after thinking it over, most will realize who was at fault in the end.

  6. I feel like Hamilton would’ve won anyway – after Mercedes pitted Bottas onto mediums I felt Hamilton was always going to dictate the strategy and 1 stop to softs. I didn’t really feel there was a need to pit Bottas there, which could’ve prevented us from having a monumental battle if they were both on the strategy, with Hamilton the slightly quicker driver behind Bottas defending insanely well.
    But even so, those first 20 laps were as good as any I can remember.

    1. 1 stop to hards* of course.

    2. It did seem odd that Bottas on the mediums could only go as far as the Ferraris on the softs before pitting.
      Seemed a weird strategy to me.

      1. Bottas is harder on the tyres than Hamilton. If anything, who gets to pit first has the advantage.
        Hamilton was faster for a few laps even after Bottas had the new tyres on.

        But his race for the win was done after the SC. If he went for hard tyres to go to the end he would’ve lost position to Vettel anyway, and out of fear of him being unable to overtake as Ferrari is still too quick on the straights, they did it the way they did.

    3. Bottas stopped the computer said so. Hamilton followed his gut

      1. I would be interested to hear the team radio between Hamilton and Mercedes when Bottas made his first pit stop.

        1. Yes, Lewis don’t worry we contacted F 1 Assistance and ordered a safety car to help you during the next incident.

      2. @falken Mercedes told Hamilton to stay out. Why would they force him to pit, when he had decent pace and was certainly not going to rejoin ahead of Bottas, so he had nothing to lose by staying out? They did the same in Austria as well. This wasn’t a stroke of genius on Lewis’ part.

  7. Great race good win for Hamilton, the Leclerc Verstappen battle was excellent.

    1. Lucky win you mean

      1. No not lucky really. Hamilton went from softs to hards and completed the race on a one stop. Bottas went from medium to medium and so was always going to have to stop again.

        This means that Bottas would have kept the lead if there was no safety car, but he would have then lost it to HAM regardless as he had to stop a second time.

      2. Kind of Lucky, but lets be honest, no-one was going to beat him.

  8. Hamilton is heading for the most wins in a season record.

    1. Yes. For three reasons

      1. He is very quick

      But also :

      2. There are a lot more races now than in the 60s/70s
      3. Cars are a lot more reliable now than ever before – by a big margin
      4. He has the best car
      5. His team mate is good – but not great.

      Not a hater – a realist

  9. Very entertaining race.
    Lewis was massively lucky with the safety car (but fair play, he acknowledged that), but he showed his class with fastest lap on the last tour with old hards!

    Leclerc was brilliant today, massively impressed with Gasly’s improved performance and gutted for Max. I don’t think he did anything wrong all race.

    Personally gutted for Lando. He missed out on good points thru bad luck and no fault of his own.

    1. Luck had nothing to do with it.

      By the time of the SC, hamilton had already set fastest laps and was eking out a significant advantage.
      Hamilton would have pitted on the hards anyway, with Bottas having to pit again. Hamilton had this
      with or without the SC.

      1. +1 Though good luck explaining that to Bottas.

      2. This I do not understand. Particularly, from Mercedes, as they allow the drivers to run the same strategy. Why would they put Bottas on Mediums and then Hamilton on Hards?

        1. This decision came when they pitted him from the safety car… if it was a normal pit with no safety car it might have been medium tyres

        2. @krichelle
          i believe they have multiple strategies available for drivers, and allow both side of the garage to fight (fair and if possible and not to endanger whole points/team)

          ham was feeling the car better, and entire time he was at botta’s gearbox! only 1 lap he backed off to 1.2 gap, rest was between .8 – 0.4 secs so bottas didnt really get away, or ham made the life not easy for him.

          seeing how ham was performing, with or without sc, ham had higher chance to go to the end with the hards when bot switched for meds… driver/garage side make the decisions together…

        3. They had time to see Gasly’s pace on the hards – ie it wasn’t far off the medium pace so a bit of a no-brainer. So Bottas really lost out as he was leading and pitted first on this occasion.

          However, Hamilton had the better race-pace presumably due to his setup. He was quicker on the Hard than Bottas on the Medium.

      3. +1 I have no idea how people are ignoring the fact that Bottas was not faster than Hamilton even after he pitted and was on fresh tyres, he was always going to have to do an extra pit stop more than Lewis.

        1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
          14th July 2019, 16:34

          he wasn’t instantly faster – but consider his tyres need to warm up. But then just before the safety car, he was closing the gap to hamilton. If Hamilton had a normal pit stop – the same time as Bottas, he would have come out slightly further behind Bottas than when Bottas pitted.

        2. After his 1st pit-stop (before the SC!) actually BOT was closing the gap to HAM. I reckon it was a big gap indeed (17sec or so) but, the weird part is that BOT was on a 2 stopper although he started from PP so, he had priority for the win. For Mercedes to stop 2 times was unnecessary, that’s why I think BOT was screwed via strategy. They didn’t hurry to switch strategy and equip him with Hards even after HAM made his pit-stop and it was obvious that his 2 stops strategy is not going to work anymore at all.

          1. Bottas couldn’t make a one stop work, too much tyre wear.

          2. @mg1982, I believe Bottas was suffering from problems with his front left tyre wearing out more quickly than those around him, so that was probably forcing him into a two stop strategy.

            As for why Mercedes did not hurriedly switch strategy, I think the reason for that was because Bottas had been caught by the safety car by that point, so they probably judged it was not worth the loss in time and position that would have potentially dropped him behind the Red Bull and Ferrari drivers, who were then going to the end on the hard tyres.

      4. I can’t predict what would have happened in the 2nd half of the race if a safety car hadn’t happened, nor if it had only been a VSC, but what I can say is a free pit stop is lucky unless you have gained the full gap by your own driving alone.
        It wouldn’t have surprised me if Hamilton had wom anyway, but it would have been a great battle that we missed out on.

        1. F1oSaurus (@)
          14th July 2019, 16:43

          @eurobrun nonsense. Bottas wasn’t faster than Hamilton and he still had to make an extra pitstop.

          Bottas would simply have been 20 seconds behind after his second stop. Zero battle in that case either

          Bottas put everything on a Q3 setup. Gambling that Mercedes restrictions on attacking your team mate would keep him in front of Hamilton’s 7 tenths faster long stint pace. It failed. Again.

          I truly wish Mercedes puts an end to this. Bottas focusing entirely on Q3 setup means he’s slow during the race. Which compromises his result and if he actually manages to get in front of Hamilton, he compromises both their pace

          1. @f1osaurus
            But what’s to say Hamilton wasn’t also gonna do 2 stops before the SC made one stop a no brainer?
            That’s 20s gone immediately.
            We don’t know what Mercedes strategy was gonna be, but I can’t help but feel the SC dictated Lewis’ eventual strategy.

          2. F1oSaurus (@)
            14th July 2019, 17:03

            @eurobrun Hamilton knew he had 7 tenths race pace advantage over Bottas. He was never going to follow Bottas race strategy.

          3. @f1osaurus

            Hamilton knew he had 7 tenths race pace advantage over Bottas. He was never going to follow Bottas race strategy

            Exactly. Bottas was barely gaining on HAM after pitting onto new mediums. I agree too with your setup comment. Bottas’s strategy is to grab qualifying with a one lap setup, then defend from a faster Hamilton, counting on the latter not altering the pact of non-aggression they’ve had. I thought HAM could have been tougher to block Bottas repassing in the first stint, but he proved correct to be generous and let the race play out again.

          4. @eurobrun

            Why would Hamilton go for a 2 stop when he had almost made half race distance on a set of tyres that had almost done qualifying and spent a significant number of laps in the dirty air of another car? That makes no sense.

  10. Good race. Very good.

    It is very encouraging to see Max and Charles having a go at each other without crying for the Stewards to get involved.

    I love that McLaren and Renault are clawing their way back into the fight.

    It is nice that Haas have decided to keep Williams company back there but come on guys – “Retch Energy” needs more coverage OK!

    1. @nullapax
      +1

      It is very encouraging to see Max and Charles having a go at each other without crying for the Stewards to get involved.

      For me this was the highlight of the race. Not just the pass,but the fact that there was no whinging.The fact that Lec may still be sore from Austria is a great thing.Look forward to more of these races.

  11. Exciting start to the race. BOT defended well for the first 15+ laps of the race, but the fact that HAM was always within a second for that long suggests he had more race pace (something Coulthard pointed out in commentary). Of course having more pace is one thing and passing is another- but I don’t think even in a straight dogfight without the SC BOT had the pace to win. BOT pitted the same time as the Ferraris who were on softs and the fact that Merc put him on a 2 stop strategy seems to me like he was struggling with the tyres. Maybe Keith’s post race radio transmissions will reveal more.

    Re: Seb Vettel. I have never been his biggest fan but even I am starting to feel sorry for him. You don’t win 4 championships by being an average driver but evidence seems to suggest that he has been on the decline since 2014. With LeClerc starting to prove the more dependable driver- I think- and I’m going to stick out my neck on this one- that he should genuinely consider quitting at the end of the season. The past 2 years haven’t done Vettel’s stock much good- imagine if the same continues to happen this year and next. It would be sad if history was to look back on him in a negative light because I genuinely believe that he deserves to be up there despite the past 2 and a half years.

    1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
      14th July 2019, 16:36

      Vettel to me looked the best driver on the grid in 2015

      1. Really? I struggle to see how you come to that conclusion.

        1. Because casuals only see the results they cant see that vettel could have a mediocre race and still finish on the podium mostly because of kimi being uncompetitive and all other teams being to far away

          1. Well put.

      2. F1oSaurus (@)
        14th July 2019, 16:56

        @thegianthogweed Not better than Bottas though, surely?

        Still indeed for Vettel 2015 was a “good” season. Only 4 races blundered away.

        Not really an achievement that would make a driver “best” per se, but still.

        1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
          14th July 2019, 17:21

          @blazzz
          @carlosmedrano

          https://www.racefans.net/2015/12/18/2015-f1-driver-rankings-1-sebastian-vettel/

          I should maybe have worded it more like this: I think he had the best season of any driver concidering the car he was in. I didn’t suddenly think he was the best driver on the grid as soon as 2015 started….

          I think many seriously under rated vettel this year. The car just wasn’t as good as Mercedes overall that year but he still got some very solid wins. I think he got more out of the car than anyone else did for it’s ability this season.

          Given Keith who i think will pay a lot of attention to the drivers performances over the season, I don’t think he would have rated Vettel #1 that year for no reason. I didn’t think this because of this review, I thought he had had the best season back then before i read this article.

          And @f1osaurus
          I don’t understand your comment either. I think Vettel had one noticably poor race in Mexico that year, not really anywhere else. And I have no clue what Bottas has to do with this.

          1. Fair points- But I really have to disagree with you (and Keith) on that.

            Firstly, no disrepect to Kimi but I don’t think at that point he was a benchmark. In 2008/2009- Massa already had his measure and Alonso arguably inflicted heavier defeats to Kimi than Seb managed.

            I also don’t believe Seb outperformed his machinery that year- while that is not to say he didn’t have a solid season. But ultimately these sort of things are subjective and people are entitled to their views.

          2. F1oSaurus (@)
            14th July 2019, 19:53

            @thegianthogweed All that says is that Vettel had a worse team mate.

            Bottas was a lot better than Massa while Massa and Raikkonen were pretty much on the same level. So with that in mind Bottas would be pretty much at the same level as Vettel.

    2. Yeah, but thing is he didn’t had the car to really fight HAM in 2017 and 2018. Ferraris performances were kinda volatile, plus in 2017 reliability was a factor too. Nothing changed this year regarding the performance: they had the car to take PP in Austria, but their pace dropped significantly in the race. LEC performance in Austria was flattered by VER’s bad start, otherwise VER would have won by a 10-15sec advantage. It seems to me RBR now is 2nd best car in race trim, Ferrari 3rd.

      1. F1oSaurus (@)
        14th July 2019, 17:01

        @mg1982 Vettel did have the car to fight Hamilton and he was driving the fastest car in 2018.

        He simply blundered away his chances. 7 races blundered in 2018 alone. According to analysis from Motorsport total.de that cost him 142 points. And of course the title by a big margin.

        Just like this year when he threw the win away in Bahrain and Canada. Plus he underperformed massively in Baku and Silverstone.

        Although granted Vettel’s direction of development doesn’t seem to help the car go faster for him. It’s helping Leclerc more and more though

        1. @f1osaurus

          Vettel did have the car to fight Hamilton and he was driving the fastest car in 2018

          Nonsense. In addition to having the best allround car over the season, Mercedes as a team were light years ahead of Ferrari.
          Vettel already hinted the 2018 car was difficult to drive. Mercedes made massive strides again with their new wheels and brake cooling.

          1. F1oSaurus (@)
            14th July 2019, 19:50

            @bigjoe Hahahahah you are such a hoot. Really cute how you personally made up that Vettel “hinted” that “the car was hard to drive” as an excuse for all the blundering.

            Point still is though. Vettel wasted 142 points and the championships.

          2. Really? All of the pundits who viewed onboard footage said that the Ferrari was much easier to drive and was far more planted.

            They’re all wrong, but Joseph is right. Sure, you’ve convinced me.

            When has Seb ever demonstrated an ability to wrestle around a difficult car? The one race in a wet Monza when his terrible teammate, Seb 2, also qualified really well, proving that the Toro Rosso was inherently good in those conditions?

      2. The only thing “volatile” in 2018 was Vettel.

        Ferrari had hands down the fastest car for 2/3rds of the season.

        Hamilton or Verstappen in that 2018 Ferrari would win the title against any Mercedes.

    3. Just a word on this.

      Bottas pitted early due in part to him flat spotting his tires trying to stay ahead of Hamilton.
      At the time Botta came in, there was less than 2 seconds between them. When Bottas came in Hamilton was able to drive a lot faster, claiming the fastest lap.

      When bottas came out, Hamilton continued to drive faster. Bottas would have taken a lap or two to get his new tires up to race speed. Hamilton had a chance to pit soon after Bottas but stayed out, at which point he was on a different strategy – a one stop on harder tires.

      Its this difference in strategy which decided the race. Because Bottas pitted early, he was always going to pit again, regardless of what tire he was placed on. His Mediums in theory should have given him a speed advantage, over the hard tires. Bottas should have had that same advantage when he pitted again.

      Hamilton drove a lot better on hards than anyone could have predicted. His fastest lap at the end made
      that point. It will be interesting to see the how the other teams use those Hard tires in the coming races, given what Lewis acheived today.

      1. +1

        That is a fantastic comment. Accurate and objective. Complete agree.

      2. It will be interesting to see the how the other teams use those Hard tires in the coming races, given what Lewis acheived today.

        But doesn’t “hard” mean different compound for each weekend? I know there are only limited one compounds, but until we know which exact “C number” it was in today’s race, I don’t think it’s a good idea to consider today’s lap times as a yard stick. Even if we did, same compound degrades totally at different rates depending upon the track.

        1. F1oSaurus (@)
          14th July 2019, 19:59

          @rockgod On the other hand, they adept the compounds for each track.

          Though agreed the delta between the used compounds isnt always the same, but even so it’s staggering that Hamilton set the fastest lap on very worn hard tyres while Bottas was slower on soft tyres (2 compounds faster and fresh).

          But then Bottas solely set his car up for a fast lap in Q3. While on the other hand, Hamilton explained that he didn’t want to give to much away from the good race setup he had found. So it makes sense that Bottas was faster in Q3 (well sort of) and Hamilton was a lot faster on long run pace.

    4. Agree …

  12. I think this race proves that max isn’t special in wheel to wheel as long as the other driver snoops to his level

    1. Josh (@canadianjosh)
      14th July 2019, 21:18

      Lol, smoke another one Medrano

    2. I’ve always wondered about that myself. Now LEC and VER are, at least in the race trim, in comparable machinery and both don’t have WCC to lose.

      In the post race interview LEC said how Austria GP opened his eyes on what’s allowed in racing. I’m sure this race won’t be the last time these 2 will bang wheels and I’m looking forward to rest of the season for that.

    3. NeverElectric
      15th July 2019, 4:58

      Good observation. Max gets away with his sometimes-crazy racing because the pace of the RB has been such that it was always immediately behind the top two (Merc and Ferrari), and the drivers of both those teams were either focused on winning the title (Lewis, Vettel) or supporting their teammates in doing so (Bottas, Kimi) – so, effectively, those drivers had a lot to lose if they engaged in Verstappen’s kamikaze driving.
      Leclerc, seemingly after the many instances when he has been on the pace but ended up performing poorly thanks sometimes to errors by the team or by himself, has decided he’s got nothing to lose as well. And the result is that Max was moaning about Leclerc “racing a bit too hard” at the end of the race.
      I think Max is going to be getting a bit of his own medicine from other drivers from this point on. I laughed when I saw him moan about Charles “moving too late” to block him (Max) – a move that Max himself more or less made his signature technique. The other midfield drivers will have noted that this is the way to race Max. And they will be coming for him in the races to come.
      And while I did not like Vettel rear-ending Max, I have to I felt ok knowing it was Max on the receiving end of that treatment – Ocon must have smiled when he saw that on the TV monitors.

  13. David (@billyboltaction)
    14th July 2019, 17:39

    Quite a few comments talking about how lucky HAM was with the safety car and having hard tyres fitted that he could take to the end, and yes it was luck that put him in front. However, for me at this point BOT still had a chance to show his quality. Right at the safety car restart he only had a handful of laps on his medium tyres and HAM was on cold and slower hards yet BOT wasn’t even close to putting HAM under pressure. If BOT had been all over HAM as HAM was to BOT at the start (on the same tyre!) then that would have shown me that BOT deserved the win but he faded almost immediately. HAM had some luck today, no doubt, but I also believe he had the better drive as well and deserved the win.

    1. HAM was determined to win today. His momentum was immense. I think what he did on last lap with worn Hards (compared to the time BOT managed to do on softs a couple of laps before) says it all really about today’s winner.

  14. Yup fair comment. Ham was so close on same tyres, the least we could have expected is Bot to put up a fight in the restart.

    Arguably if he managed to pass Hamilton, on faster tyres at the restart, we could have had the battle we all wanted towards the end of the race.

  15. @carlosmedrano

    I think this race proves that max isn’t special in wheel to wheel as long as the other driver snoops to his level

    Nothing to do with having the 6th fastest car then?

    1. Max has the 6th fastest car? Shows what little you know.

  16. Hamilton drove a lot better on hards than anyone could have predicted. His fastest lap at the end made that point

    Hopefully Keith will prove the track didn’t get faster and no other driver improved their PB during this period. Even so, only Bottas has a car in the same league as Lewis. What a difference 1 race makes.

    1. Hi all, first comment in several years.
      Am I the only one to think that the SC is robbing us of nice different strategy races? The moment a SC enters mid race almost everyone pits for the last time and everyone stays with the tyres with the same number of laps, packed together but already in the right order for their pace.
      (Today was clearly an exception, but I still believe the race would be even better without the SC, although in my opinion HAM would still win)

      1. William Jones
        14th July 2019, 22:40

        You’re not wrong, not at all, but it’s a problem to which there isn’t a good solution and all you can really do is hope that over a season, advantages and disadvantages are somewhat balanced.

        1. They could close the pitlane during a safety car, but even then drivers that have yet to stop are at a disadvantage.

        2. I’m not worried about someone getting advantage or disadvantage. My issue is that the races usually become a bit dull after the SC.

          In fact, I don’t like the SC since it’s beginnings, I don’t like the idea of something subject to human judgement be so important to the decision of the race. It’s like in football every time the medical crew enters the pitch the match goes back to 0-0.

          In my opinion, close the pit lane and at the end of SC put the cars with the same distances they had before, this could be achieved in several different ways.

  17. I don’t understand how people are acting like Bottas was a victim today, Hamilton was able stay 0.3-0.8 behind Bottas on the same tyre and even pass at one point. Are people just ignoring the fact that Bottas could not get within DRS on the fresh softer tyre after the restart? He just did not have the pace in the race today.
    He should have been able to get infront of Hamilton after the SC period on the faster tyre and pull out a gap, which would have allowed him to attack Hamilton in the latter stage of the race on much fresher tyres.

    1. Josh (@canadianjosh)
      14th July 2019, 21:21

      I agree, it would have been a fight for the whole race if not for the SC and maybe not even the whole race. Who knows? Maybe Bottas holds him off maybe Ham out races him wheel to wheel. This is the unknown in racing, no one knew a SC was going to come today particularly when it did but racing wouldn’t be the same if we knew what’s was going to happen beforehand.

    2. Well we won’t know now will we? They should have just VSC’d and saved all the contention. I’m surprised they didn’t cut to ANOTHER kid in Mercedes gear cheering for Lewis in the grandstands as the safety car was announced. Puke…

    3. Well, agree that HAM was faster but, BOT managed to keep him behind until his 1st pit-stop. So, if a driver can keep behind a faster driver… he’s still the winner.

      1. He didn’t keep him behind though he was forced to pit stop due to excessively wearing and locking up from the pressure Lewis put on him..Even once he had gotten his fresh set up to temperature he was only gaining by around a tenth a lap..

  18. Except that it wasn’t thrilling… It was actually boring for most part. Yeah there were few good moments but far from thrilling. Merc, again was untouchable and this SC seems a bit overkill in this case and handed Lewis a win on his “home” soil which I’m sure would taste much better if he actually won in on track. The rest of the pack was just cruising and top 3 teams again had no competition.

    1. See the long discussion early in the comments. Since Japan crane on the track rightly means VSC or SC. Which would have helped Hamilton more could be analyzed, but one the Affa was dug in Bottas was out of luck.

    2. the safety car was correct. imagine another car sliding into the crane again. part of racing is the gamble of strategy. lewis even thanked his side of the garage for the strategy. was a good race. some good duels. lewis did the same with rosberg setting up his car more for race and less for quali. a racing jedi master hahaha!

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