As Sunday dawned and the sun rose over the historic Nurburgring in Germany, the main talking point surprisingly wasn’t tyres, but more the massive mistake Mercedes made with their driver Nico Rosberg in qualifying.
Rosberg himself was clearly still smarting from not making in into Q3 yesterday – but at least the prospect of him battling his way forward from 11th on the grid during the race would make exciting viewing for the fans watching in the grandstands and at home.
The only changes to the grid from yesterday was that Pic had been given a five-place
penalty for changing his gearbox, and would start the race from the back, after qualifying his Caterham in 19th.
With Hamilton on pole, Mercedes still had a good chance of winning the race. But as the lights went out, Red Bull got a storming start, with Vettel and Webber both challenging Hamilton for the lead off the start line. By the first corner Vettel was out front, with Webber in second – and Raikkonen was already bothering Hamilton for third place by the end of the first lap.
Lap four, and Massa – who’d made up a place during the first lap – spun off the track, stalling his Ferrari in the run-off area and signalling the end of this race. Luckily his prancing horse could be recovered to the pits under waved yellows, and there was no need to bring the safety car out at this point in the race.
Di Resta was the first to pit on lap five. But his mechanics released his car into the path of oncoming Vergne, who was also coming in for his first pit stop. But by the end of the next lap race control had announced that the incident would not be investigated until after the race, so any penalty given out would be awarded at the next Grand Prix in Hungary.
Hamilton pitted at the end of lap six, hoping to use the undercut to vault him ahead of the Red Bulls in the stops. He fed back out into the pack in 10th, behind his teammate Rosberg, who’d also got a terrible start to the race.
Vettel pitted a lap later, and came out again comfortably in front of Rosberg, and therefore Hamilton – leaving Mercedes on the back foot once again.
Webber pitted at the end of lap 8. But disaster struck after his pit crew had a problem with his right-rear tyre – and as he pulled away from his box, the tyre worked itself loose, flying across the pit lane and hitting an unsuspecting cameraman in the process.
Thankfully, the cameraman wasn’t seriously injured, and was whisked away to the local hospital to get checked out. Meanwhile, Mark was wheeled back into the pits and new tyres were fitted – and he eventually came back out onto the track in 21st and last place. Like Di Resta earlier, his team’s unsafe release was slotted to be investigated after the race.
Further forward, and Hamilton was growing frustrated behind his teammate Rosberg, who was slower on a completely different strategy. Hamilton got straight onto the radio to complain about Rosberg holding him up, but Mercedes seemed reluctant to ask Rosberg to move aside.
Hamilton finally got past Rosberg on lap 16, releasing him to hunt down Hulkenberg – who hadn’t pitted – for fourth place.
By lap 15, Grosjean was absolutely flying in his Lotus, and had vaulted teammate Raikkonen for second place. And as he set fastest laps, it looked as though he could well be on course to sneak up behind Vettel and catch him unawares.
Behind him, Raikkonen was chasing down Hamilton for an effective third place, which he snatched from the Brit on lap 19.
Hamilton’s day went from bad to worse as Alonso closed in behind him as well. What followed was an almighty scrap between the pair that would last for the next few laps, only ending when Hamilton finally pitted on lap 23.
On lap 24, disaster struck when Bianchi’s car suddenly caught fire and came to a stop at the side of the track – or so we all thought. Once the fire had been put out, the Marussia started rolling backwards down the track of its own accord, just missing race leader Vettel and second place Grosjean, and triggering a safety car period as a result.
The drivers all took the opportunity to duck into the pits to change tyres, with Vettel and Grosjean coming comfortably back out into the lead again.
What had so far been a terrible day for Williams got worse as Bottas had trouble with his tyres in the pits, bringing him back out in a lowly 15th place. Meanwhile, Vergne had retired from the race with hydraulics problems – leaving him frustrated at a time when he was hoping to impress Red Bull, and be considered for Webber’s soon-to-be-vacated seat at the team.
As the safety car continued to slow the pack down, the teams started to assess their options. Having used both compound tyres already, Lotus – who are notoriously conservative on their tyrewear – were left considering whether they could run both their drivers to the end of the race without stopping again.
The safety car came in at the end of lap 29, exactly half-way through the race. Vettel got a clean getaway, with Grosjean and Raikkonen following close behind him.
Grosjean was soon setting fastest laps, and by lap 34 was only a second behind Vettel. A great battle was shaping up between Vettel, Grosjean and Raikkonen, but try as they might the Lotuses just couldn’t seem to make their way past the mighty Vettel – despite Grosjean being only half a second behind.
Further back, Hamilton was still having a terrible time of it running around in sixth, and was actually now behind his former teammate Button – who was doing a great job in fifth place in his tardy McLaren.
Grosjean pitted at the end of lap 40, taking the heat off Vettel and releasing Raikkonen to chase down the leader. Raikkonen responded by setting the fastest lap, while Vettel pitted – and came out narrowly ahead of Grosjean. Raikkonen opted to stay out longer, trying to stretch out a lead before coming in for his final pitstop of the race.
It was proving to be a tough afternoon for Rosberg following his terrible qualifying yesterday. Despite predictions that he would carve his way through the field, he made no progress whatsoever – and by three quarter distance, he was still running around in a lowly 10th place.
Hamilton pitted on lap 46 for his final stop of the race, putting him back out behind Rosberg – not the place the race polesitter was hoping to be with only 15 laps left. He quickly cleared Rosberg on his fresh tyres, but any hopes he had of getting on the podium now seemed very unlikely indeed.
Back out front, Raikkonen was still running around on his third set of tyres, with almost a 15 second gap back to Vettel. While second place Alonso needed to stop again to run the soft tyres, it looked increasingly likely that Raikkonen could stay out until the end.
With 10 laps to go, however, Raikkonen dashed into the pits to change onto the soft tyres, releasing Vettel and Grosjean, and putting Raikkonen back out into third position.
With the Lotuses closing in, it looked like we’d be in for an exciting end to the race. On Lap 55, a message from Lotus told Grosjean that Kimi was faster than him on the option tyre – so Grosjean duly moved out of the way and let his teammate past. Then Raikkonen faced a five lap sprint to the end to try and catch and overtake Vettel.
The pair were soon trading fastest sectors, while Alonso closed in on Grosjean behind them. On the final lap, Raikkonen was just a fraction of a second away from having DRS – and Vettel eventually crossed the line just over a second in front. Grosjean joined the pair on the podium, with Alonso, Hamilton – who’d just got past Button – making up the top five. By Sarah Ellis
German GP race results:
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Sebastian Vettel |
1 |
`2 Red Bull |
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2 |
7 |
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3 |
8 |
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4 |
3 |
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5 |
10 |
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6 |
5 |
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7 |
2 |
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8 |
6 |
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9 |
9 |
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10 |
11 |
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11 |
14 |
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12 |
19 |
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13 |
15 |
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14 |
12 |
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15 |
16 |
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16 |
17 |
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17 |
20 |
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18 |
21 |
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19 |
23 |
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20 |
18 |
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21 |
22 |
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22 |
4 |
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