The atmosphere is always electric at the British Grand Prix – and with Lewis Hamilton on pole, the home crowd had even more to cheer about as the cars headed out to the grid.
Sadly qualifying wasn’t as successful for the three other British drivers. After qualifying in fifth place, Di Resta was demoted to the back of the grid when his Force India came in underweight at the end of the session. His penalty moved Button up into the top 10, following a poor qualifying session that saw him knocked out in Q2. And after qualifying in last place, Chilton moved up to 20th as a result of the penalties for Di Resta and Van der Garde.
As the lights went out, Hamilton got the perfect getaway from pole. But Vettel put a move on Rosberg straight away, snatching second place before they even got to the first corner.
It wasn’t such a great start for the second Red Bull, though, as Webber had some slight contact with Grosjean, leaving him with languishing back in 15th with damage to his car. Meanwhile Massa got the best start of the pack, making up six places from eleventh to fifth.
Hamilton was quickly putting in fastest laps, opening up the gap to Vettel to 2.1 seconds by lap five. But disaster struck on lap eight when his car suffered a delamination along the Wellington Straight, leaving him to limp back to the pits to change tyres, and effectively ruining any chance he had of winning his home grand prix.
The tyre situation got even more worrying two laps later, when Massa appeared to suffer a similar fate to Hamilton. He spun off in the same place with tyre failure ¬– and like Hamilton was left to limp back to the pits for new rubber.
A flurry of pitstops followed, with Ferrari bringing Alonso in for a precautionary tyre change, while Webber got a change of front nose and wing following the damage to his car during the first lap. Alonso came out of the pits fighting, and by lap 14 had worked his way up to fourth place.
Up front, Vettel pitted on lap 14, coming back out comfortably in the lead, with Rosberg still behind him in second, and Adrian Sutil in third.
Lap 15 saw Vergne suffer the third tyre failure of the race, with Raikkonen behind him narrowly avoiding any serious injury as the debris flew off and onto the racetrack.
With so much rubber out on track, the safety car was deployed on lap 16 while the marshals got to work cleaning up the debris.
Racing got underway again on lap 22, with Vettel storming off into the lead once again. Webber was straight on the pace too, overtaking Perez for eighth place. By this point the drivers had been told to stay away from the curbs to avoid any more tyre problems – but as the race restarted, it appeared none of them were taking any notice of the orders as they continued to race as normal.
Hamilton was back in 14th following his tyre failure, but started to make his way through the field slowly, passing the Sauber of Gutierrez to take him up into 13th.
The second round of pitstops started around lap 30, with Alonso, Raikkonen and Webber coming in early for fresh tyres – a sensible move given the events so far in the race.
Lap 32 saw a great batlle between Brits Hamilton and Di Resta for seventh place, with Hamilton trying desperately to work his way up throught the field. Raikkonen soon joined the fray, and overtook Hamilton easily, with Alsono picking up the slip stream on his fresh tyres, and also breezing past.
Vettel pitted on lap 36, coming back out into the lead again – albeit with a reduced gap to Rosberg in second place. Further back, there was a great battle going on between Hamilton and Di Resta once again, as the Merc tried to find its way past the Force India for 11th place. Hamilton finally got past at the end of the Wellington Straight, thrilling the British crowd watching in the grandstands.
Lap 42 saw disaster strike for Vettel as he lost drive in his car, coming shuddering to a stop on the pit straight and putting him out of the race. The safety car was deployed ¬– and the British crown went wild as Rosberg took the lead for Mercedes.
The cars ran around behind the safety car for four laps while Vettel’s car was secured. Rosberg managed to fend off Raikkoen on the restart, while behind them Webber and Hamilton were on a charge, along with Alonso – who’d seemed to strangely go backwards during the safety car period.
Less than a lap later, and there was yet another tyre failure as Perez suffered a delamination, raising some serious questions about the safety of the current Pirelli tyres. Although Perez headed straight into the pits for a tyre change, there was too much damage to the car, and he was forcedc to retire with just over five laps to go.
By lap 47, Webber had charged his way up to third place, and seemed to be posing a serious threat to the top two. Behind him Alonso and Hamitlon were still battling, and quickly moved up to fourth and fifth places as the eyed up a final place on the podium.
Raikkonen had asked his team for a tyre change during the safety car period, but they’d told him to go to the end of the race, leading to an exciting battle between him and Webber on lap 48. Webber won on the fresher tyres – and Raikkonen was powerless to fight back as he was passed first by Webber, then Alonso and Hamailton.
There were a nail-biting last three laps of the race, with Webber and Rosberg trading fastest laps in the closing moments, while Alonso, Raikkonen and Hamilton fiercely battled it out behind for the remaining place on the podium.
Ultimately it was Rosberg who crossed the line first, followed very closely by Webber, and Alonso making up the final podium spot. Hamilton finished fourth, with a disappointed Raikkonen fifth after Lotus left him out onthe track on used tyres. By Sarah Ellis
Provisional British Grand Prix results:
|
1 |
52 |
Winner |
|||||
|
2 |
52 |
+0.7 secs |
|||||
|
3 |
52 |
+7.1 secs |
|||||
|
4 |
52 |
+7.7 secs |
|||||
|
5 |
52 |
+11.2 secs |
|||||
|
6 |
52 |
+14.5 secs |
|||||
|
7 |
52 |
+16.3 secs |
|||||
|
8 |
52 |
+16.5 secs |
|||||
|
9 |
52 |
+17.9 secs |
|||||
|
10 |
52 |
+19.7 secs |
|||||
|
11 |
52 |
+21.1 secs |
|||||
|
12 |
52 |
+25.0 secs |
|||||
|
13 |
52 |
+25.9 secs |
|||||
|
14 |
52 |
+26.2 secs |
|||||
|
15 |
52 |
+31.6 secs |
|||||
|
16 |
52 |
+36.0 secs |
|||||
|
17 |
52 |
+67.6 secs |
|||||
|
18 |
52 |
+67.7 secs |
|||||
|
19 |
51 |
+1 Lap |
|||||
|
20 |
46 |
+6 Laps |
|||||
|
Ret |
41 |
+11 Laps |
|||||
|
Ret |
|
35 |
+17 Laps |
