Reigning World Champion Lewis Hamilton took a dominating win at the German GP at Hockenheim. While Ricciardo and Verstappen took 2nd and 3rd respectively, Nico Rosberg could only manage 4th after he got a time penalty for a move he made on Verstappen during the race.
Rosberg, who won the last time F1 raced here in 2014, made a terrible start from pole and dropped to fourth on the opening lap behind the two Red Bulls. His pass on Verstappen at the Spitzkehre hairpin dashed his podium hopes, however, as stewards ruled he forced Verstappen off the track – although Rosberg argued that Verstappen had moved in the braking zone, which tightened the corner’s exit for him.After taking his 5s penalty in the pits, Rosberg was unable to chase down the Red Bulls.
In his 100th Grand Prix, Ricciardo finished second – although Verstappen had passed him at the first corner. Unlike at Barcelona earlier this year, an alternate tyre strategy between the Red Bulls played into Ricciardo’s hands.Ferrari was unable to enter the frontrunning fight again, finishing fifth and sixth with Sebastian Vettel ahead of Kimi Raikkonen.
Hamilton led lap one by 1.3s from Verstappen, with Ricciardo defending from Rosberg. Vettel got ahead of Raikkonen for fifth, with Valtteri Bottas seventh for Williams from Nico Hulkenberg (Force India), McLaren’s Jenson Button and Felipe Massa’s Williams, who complained “somebody hit me”.
His assailant was Jolyon Palmer’s Renault, which had to pit for repairs. “After the guy hit me, the rear of the car is not the same,” said Massa, who tumbled down the order and would later retire. Rosberg made a concerted effort to pass Ricciardo on lap two, but was elbowed wide in the Mercedes Arena having drawn alongside. The race quickly settled as the drivers nursed their supersoft tyres to their target lap for the first pitstop. Verstappen complained he was “struggling with the rear tyres” as Hamilton set fastest lap by half a second on lap nine and pulled 5s clear out front.
Verstappen and Rosberg were the first of the leaders to pit, both rejoining on supersoft tyres – with Rosberg losing 1.3s due to a slow left-rear change and then getting mired in traffic.Ricciardo pitted on the next lap for softs, as Hamilton banged in a sequence of fastest laps.
Hamilton stopped at the end of lap 14, switching to soft-compound tyres, having held a 16s lead over Raikkonen, who also pitted. Hamilton rejoined with a 6s lead over Verstappen, Ricciardo and Rosberg – who set fastest lap on his new rubber. Raikkonen had a slow first stop as he switched to softs, and rejoined 4s in arrears of Vettel, who was already 5s behind Rosberg.Raikkonen questioned whether they changed the front wing flap angle for the harder tyres “because it doesn’t feel like it”, and he was told they had.
Hamilton stopped for the final time on lap 48, taking softs for his last stint. He rejoined 10s clear of Ricciardo, who had Verstappen 2s behind. “Let’s have a little push to make the gap to Verstappen,” Ricciardo was told.The Red Bulls unleashed their raw pace at this point, which was even faster than Mercedes at this stage on new, softer tyres.Ricciardo carved 3s out of Hamilton’s lead on his supersofts, but the leader raised his pace with 15s to go and they matched each other’s pace to the finish.
Behind the Mercs and Red Bulls, the Ferraris trailed home in fifth and sixth. Hulkenberg passed a struggling Bottas for seventh with six laps remaining – just as light rain began to fall.Button passed Bottas, whose soft tyres had hit the cliff and was touring around, for eighth. Force India’s Sergio Perez nailed Alonso for the final point with an aggressive move with two laps to go.
Haas’s Esteban Gutierrez, the only driver who started on the soft, found himself embroiled in an entertaining scraps with Alonso and Perez at the end of his long first stint. He finished 12th. Grosjean finished 13th despite reporting “smoke coming from the rear of the car” at one point. Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz finished 14th after an awful first pitstop, ahead of teammate Daniil Kvyat.Kevin Magnussen finished 16th for Renault, ahead of Manor’s Pascal Werhlein. Rio Haryanto lost part of his front wing hitting teammate Werhlein in the early exchanges.
Marcus Ericsson finished 18th, ahead of the delayed Palmer and Haryanto. Felipe Nasr was a late retirement when his Sauber ground to a halt in the pitlane.
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