Thrills, spills in Chinese race
RED BULL: SUPERB JOB TO GET RICCIARDO INTO QUALIFYING Brilliant drive from ‘Honey Badger’ secures him a deserved victory.
If I thought the Bahrain race was a nail biter then the entire Chinese Grand Prix set the stage from Saturday’s qualifying through to the chequered flag on Sunday. I would not have put money on the results of qualifying ending with a front row lock out for Ferrari, taking an advantage of nearly half a second over both.
Mercedes drivers ended on row two with the Red Bulls very handy on row three.
From pole to sixth spot was covered by just 0.853 of a second – it does not get much closer.
All credit to the Red Bull mechanics and technicians after Daniel Ricciardo’s stop during the Saturday morning practice session, the car billowing smoke and his words over the radio – “I’ve got an issue, I’ve got an issue”.
With just two hours before the start of qualifying and the RB14 requiring an engine change, it looked as though he would be starting from the back of the grid.
An incredible effort by both his and Verstappen’s team got the Aussie out with just two minutes to spare.
He drove an untested car to qualify for the next round, and go on to take an incredible sixth on the grid.
The performance of the Maranello cars surprised everyone.
It appeared that the previously dominant Mercedes team had no answer and would now have to watch their backs to ensure that the resurgent Red Bull’s stayed behind.
A good start from the field with no real incidents but Kimi Raikkonen suffered as his team-mate, Sebastian Vettel, cut across and blocked the Finn.
Raikkonen had to back off into turn one and lost position to Valtteri Bottas and Max Verstappen.
Vettel started to pull away from Bottas until the first round of pit stops when, responding to the Mercedes stops for both drivers, Vettel pitted, but the team seemed somewhat slower than usual.
Perhaps the memory of last weekend’s pit lane debacle was still fresh in the crew’s minds, but the result was the German rejoining the track behind Bottas.
The incident between the Toro Rossos of Brendon Hartley and Pierre Gasly resulted in a penalty for the Frenchman, but left a large amount of debris on the track. The race director deployed the safety car, unfortunately compromising both Vettel and Bottas.
The yellow flag period was confirmed just after the two had passed the safety car line.
This meant that neither would have the opportunity of a quick pit stop and left them out on track with well used tyres.
No such problem for the rest of the field, particularly Red Bull who, for the second time during the race, completed a double stop and came out on new soft rubber to chase the leaders.
At this point it was Bottas from Vettel, Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen, Raikkonen and Ricciardo.
“I’ve got an issue, I’ve got an issue.”
Verstappen caught the Englishman but his overtaking move did not pay off as he ran wide and opened the door to his team-mate, who had just passed Raikkonen for fifth.
From then on it was classic Ricciardo.
What a pleasure to once again witness the “Honey Badger” demonstrating why he is known as the last of the late brakers in a truly wonderful display of race craft.
He took Hamilton for third and set his sights on Vettel, in the process setting a new quickest lap.
Meanwhile, Verstappen finally passed Hamilton and chased after the flying Australian who had already taken second place from Vettel and was now chasing down the leader.
The Dutchman tried to take advantage as Vettel locked up but unfortunately he collided with the Ferrari, both cars spinning.
They continued but the German had dropped to seventh as Verstappen was heard to say: “He locked up and turned in very sharp.”
Vettel’s response of “I don’t think I need to say anything,” says it all.
Raikkonen took Hamilton and Fernando Alonso took his McLaren past the struggling Vettel for seventh.
There was no doubt that Ricciardo on fresh rubber would catch Bottas and challenge for the win. Eventually he made a brave move on the Finn and went on to take victory by nearly nine seconds.
Verstappen got a 10 second penalty for the incident with Vettel and drove hard to minimise the effect, finally taking fifth behind Hamilton with Raikkonen on the final step on the podium.
Following the race, Verstappen went straight to Vettel and apologised for the incident, accepting all blame.
While I appreciate that it seems somewhat unfair that his penalty still allowed him to finish three positions ahead of the man he hit, that is racing.
If we continue with the quality of racing we have seen so far this year, it should be an amazing season.