Hamilton’s podium finish sours Rosberg’s victory in Belgium

SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS: Nico Rosberg was handed a much-needed break in the Formula One title battle which he duly converted by winning Sunday’s Belgian Grand Prix, but victory could have tasted much sweeter for the German. Rosberg went into the weekend knowing this was his race to lose.

Mercedes team mate and title rival Lewis Hamilton was set to start at the back of the field after taking a planned series of enginerelated grid penalties.

That gave Rosberg the perfect opportunity to reignite his title challenge after a run of lacklustre form and make major inroads into the Briton’s 19-point advantage in the standings. Instead, he came away still trailing Hamilton by nine points after the reigning triple world champion took full advantage of collisions involving his rivals, race disruptions and some spectacular overtaking, to finish a shock third.

“I just saw at the end after the chequered flag I looked at the results and I knew Daniel was behind me and then I see Hamilton in third,” said Rosberg, who cruised to a comfortable win from pole-position in a chaotic race ahead of Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo. “I was like ‘What, seriously?’. I don’t know what happened, I haven’t looked at the details, but for sure he must have done a great job.”

RUSSIAN WRESTLER WANTS JUSTICE

MOSCOW: Olympic wrestler Inna Trazhukova is seeking justice after being hit in the face by the president of the Russian wrestling federation after missing out on a medal in Rio, her lawyer said on Monday. The 25-year-old athlete claims that wrestling chief Mikhail Mamiashvili struck her twice in front of her teammates and foreign Olympic delegations after she lost her bronze medal match to Poland’s Monika Ewa Michalik. She has already appealed to Russia’s prosecutor general to probe assault and her lawyer Sirazhutdin Atayev said he was set to send an appeal to the Russian sports minister calling for the protection of athletes’ rights.