GENTLEMAN LEWIS
Sporting Brit hands title lead to Bottas
LEWIS HamIlton was torn last night between two sides of his personality: the clean racer he almost always is on one hand, and his ultracompetitive spirit on the other.
Certainly if he were a dirty, I’llbang-you-into-the-barriers-atallcosts kind of driver, he might have won the azerbaijan Grand Prix at the first turn.
He was on the inside of polesitter Valtteri Bottas at the start, and a michael Schumacher or an ayrton Senna would not have thought twice about pushing the Finn towards perdition, or at least squeezing him a little harder.
It is to Hamilton’s eternal credit as a sportsman that his instinct is not unscrupulous. But good
conduct can come at a price that was gnawing at him the more he thought about it as the postrace hours ticked on: Bottas took the victory, he was second and is now a point off the championship lead.
Both mercedes men left fractions of inches as they danced close to each other. Both played it fairly and drove superbly well in the defining tussle, allowing their team to claim a fourth consecutive one-two finish to begin 2019 — an unprecedentedly one-sided start to a season.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel was third, a competent afternoon’s work, with Red Bull’s max Verstappen fourth, and the second red car, of Charles leclerc, an entertaining fifth, more of which later.
But, first, Hamilton on his generosity at the start. ‘You have to remember when you are in a team as big as this that you are just one individual,’ he said. ‘Selfishly, I could have pushed a lot harder.
‘Valtteri would have lost a position, I would have gained one. But it is most likely he would have been overtaken by a Ferrari, so we have to work together.
‘While I wanted to overtake him I had to be cautious and give him space, so that we would block the front and stay there. Ultimately, I lost out, but that is the sacrifice you sometimes have to make in order for the team to win.
‘If it had been a Ferrari there my approach would have been different, but this is how it will continue for the rest of the year between Valtteri and me.
‘We have a lot of respect for each other and we continue to do so. You can see that. We discuss it before the race. We agree as gentlemen, and we stick to it.’
But deeper into the night Hamilton was less sanguine, not as sure he had chosen the right route.
‘I’ll take a certain feeling away from this race,’ he said a couple of hours of contemplation later. ‘I’ll channel it and use it.’
once away, Bottas made no mistake in keeping Hamilton at bay, though it was only towards the end that he felt the champion’s breath on his neck.
Yesterday’s victory tasted sweet after a late puncture cost Bottas the victory here a year ago.
He has now won twice this season — to zero last — and finished second twice. Ditto Hamilton, though Bottas’s fastest lap in melbourne gives him the slenderest of numerical edges. one suspects that when it gets down to the important end of the season, Hamilton will no longer be as willing to play mr nice Guy and will unleash far too much firepower for the Finn.
Hamilton’s belief in that likelihood is, it seems, a reason he is so relaxed for now, so unperturbed by Bottas’s mini-revival.
Credit to mercedes for allowing their pair to race unhampered. toto Wolff, the team principal, did not issue any instructions to hold position late on despite tV cameras capturing him pressing a button to communicate with someone. His drivers?
no. He was, he said, talking to the pit wall about general strategy. ‘they were allowed to race,’ he added.
Ferrari have made it too easy for mercedes this season. though the Italians’ pace is not rank bad, strategy and driver errors have mounted up.
they were fastest in Bahrain last month and would probably have won yesterday had leclerc not splattered his machine into the barriers on Saturday.
the 21- year- old raced well, carving his way through the field on the faster tyres early on. He led for more than a third of a frankly dull Grand Prix but his advantage was whittled away as he was kept out for ever and a day before his first stop.
He was later reshod again in search of the fastest lap, a mission he accomplished.