IN THIS ISSUE
Vettel closes points gap to hamilton
With a dominant victory in Sunday’s Belgian Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel has started to claw back the points deficit to his title rival Lewis Hamilton. As Vettel’s Ferrari demonstrated a clear power advantage on the majestic roads cutting through the Ardennes forest, it doesn’t bode well for Hamilton and Mercedes as the second half of the season gets underway.
Second-placed Hamilton referred to Ferrari’s “tricks”, a word he used to describe something with its car that is giving the team an advantage. Since the onset of the hybrid era in 2014 Mercedes has been the number one power unit to have – not anymore.
After the race, Mercedes’s team boss Toto Wolff praised the Italian team on its innovations which is believed to a clever (and legal) way of deploying the energy from the battery.
“They continue to develop their car and add performance at every single race over the past four or five races,” admitted Wolff. “We need to address the opportunities in our own car and concentrate on where we need to optimise.”
Vettel led all 44 laps at Spa to give Ferrari its first victory in Belgium since 2009 and to record the 52nd win of his career, eclipsing Alain Prost, to take him third in the all-time winners list.
Max Verstappen rounded out the podium to give his loyal Dutch supporters something to sing about as they sat in traffic heading north to the border on Sunday evening.
The race’s one and only major incident came at Turn 1 at the start. Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg misjudged his braking and rammed Fernando Alonso’s Mclaren into the air and over the top of the Sauber of Charles Leclerc. No one was injured in the melee and Hulk accepted all responsibility for the error.
Qualifying
Hamilton described the moment in which he claimed his 78th pole position as one of the “toughest qualifying sessions he could remember”. A short, sharp shower doused the Spa-Francorchamps circuit right at the beginning of Q3, which sent all 10 slick-shod runners diving into the pits for intermediate tyres. But even before the 12 minutes had elapsed, the circuit was beginning to dry and those still circulating at the end enjoyed a significant advantage.
Hamilton had already made mistakes on his two previous laps and was under pressure to find the grip on the slippery surface, ultimately posting a time nearly 0.8s quicker than title rival Vettel.
“I really can’t find the words to express how difficult it was, it was drying up in some parts and wet in others,” said Hamilton. “You saw I went off in Turn 1 and again into Turn 12, so I only had one lap left, otherwise I would have been a lot further down the order. I knew I had the pace, but it was a balance of not pushing too much or backing off too much. I’m super happy and the rain is always a friend of mine.”
The fight between the Mercedes and Ferraris would have been much closer if conditions had stayed dry – and indeed, many expected the Ferrari to take pole. In the dry Q2 session, Vettel was fastest with a 1m41.501s lap, his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was just 0.032s behind, while Hamilton was a further 0.02s further back. Amazingly close when you consider Spa is a 4.3-mile lap.
“I think we had the pace today to take pole,” said Vettel afterwards. “But in these conditions anything can happen…”
The weather was also kind to Racing Point Force India who locked out the second row of the grid, Esteban Ocon recording a time just 0.043s quicker than his team-mate Sergio Perez. In a week of significant off-track developments for the team, the appearance of the genial Ocon with Hamilton and Vettel in the top three, was widely applauded.
Another team to benefit from the fickle Ardennes weather was Haas. Romain Grosjean lined up fifth with his team-mate Kevin Magnussen in ninth place, with Raikkonen and the two Red Bulls between them.
Valtteri Bottas rounded out the top 10, but failed to set a lap time because of power unit changes, which netted him a grid penalty. He did emerge at the beginning of Q3 with the intention of giving Hamilton a tow along the Kemmel Straight, but as he hit the rain – on slicks – he looped his Mercedes around at the high-speed Blanchimont and was lucky not to hit anything. Wisely, the team decided they had no reason to take any further risk and called him in.
Race
Spa-francorchamps is the longest track on the calendar but it also has one of the shortest runs from the start line
to the first corner. The propensity for accidents is high as the field accelerates away, then suddenly jumps on the brakes for the tight La Source hairpin.
For the championship protagonists on the front row, everything played out smoothly. Hamilton held his advantage as they approached Turn 1, despite drifting a little to his left to keep Vettel at bay, but the Ferrari man was focused on getting a clean exit out of La Source, for a tow on the exit of Eau Rouge.
On the Kemmel Straight, Vettel jinked left out of Hamilton’s slipstream to take the lead, but getting a superior run behind them both were the Force Indias. Perez went left, while Ocon went right and as they approached the braking zone for Les Combes, they were momentarily all four-abreast gunning for the lead of the race.
Ocon on the inside sensibly braked early, but lost a place to his team-mate and, over the course of the next 44 laps, was never able to recover the spot back.
But as Vettel led Hamilton and the two Force Indias into Les Combes, the safety car was deployed for a dramatic-looking crash at La Source.
Due to a series of grid penalties for changes to his Renault power unit, Hulkenberg started 18th and as he approached La Source, he misjudged his braking. Locking up his wheels, he smashed into the back of Alonso’s Mclaren – the force of which was so violent, it sent the Mclaren into the air and over the back of Leclerc’s Sauber. All three were out on the spot instantly. Hulkenberg admitted all responsibility for the incident to the stewards and he was awarded a 10-place grid penalty for Monza next weekend.
“Into Turn 1 you play it cautious, you brake at the same point, then I looked in the mirrors and saw the guys behind behaving as if this was the last corner of the championship,” said Alonso afterwards.
“I saw Nico in the mirrors coming with all four wheels locked, at a very high speed. He completely missed the braking point by a long way, not just a couple of metres. There was no way I could avoid that, then I felt the impact and flew over Charles’ car.
“Usually these kinds of accidents have major consequences, but everyone involved is fine, especially Charles,” added Alonso. “Not that we needed any proof, but the halo showed again today it is a very good thing to have on the car.” Images of the Sauber’s scuffed halo surfaced during the race, reminding everyone of the importance of the safety device.
While that three-car accident was happening on the left-hand-side of the track, on the right, Bottas made a similar error. He too was at the tail of the field for power unit infringements and approaching the first corner, he hit the back of Sergey Sirotkin’s Williams, but with less force than Hulkenberg. After a race-long comeback drive, Bottas managed to finish in fourth place – including an audacious pass of Brendon Hartley around the outside of Eau Rouge – and a five-second penalty for his misdemeanour.
On the exit of Turn 1 there was yet more contact. Daniel Ricciardo’s Red Bull (which was minus its left rear wing endplate thanks to contact from Alonso’s airborne Mclaren) cannoned into the right-rear of Raikkonen, instantly giving the Ferrari a puncture. With damage to the rear wing and floor, plus a DRS flap that wouldn’t close, Raikkonen decided to call it a day.
After four laps circulating behind the safety car, the race was restarted. Hamilton was close to Vettel’s tail and considered making a move for the lead as they approached the Bus Stop Chicane. The Mercedes locked up and handed Vettel a tiny margin of advantage. Now, any chance of getting a slipstream up through Eau Rouge was over. Vettel was able to cling onto his lead.
“I probably could have gone up the inside into the last corner, maybe, just about, but again, he would just overtake us on the straight,” said Hamilton. “So I held back and tried to stay close but he just pulled away out of the last corner and then through Turn 1 as they’ve been quicker than us all weekend there. By the time I came out of Turn 1, he was quite far ahead.”
In the opening phase of the race, Hamilton couldn’t keep pace with Vettel and as he neared the end of his stint on the super-softs, his rears were graining significantly. The Mercedes man’s best chance of passing Vettel was in the pitstops, with the undercut. He pitted to switch to the softs on lap 21, then put in the fastest middle sector of the race. Ferrari reacted immediately and when Vettel emerged from his pitstop a lap later, he was still comfortably ahead of Hamilton. Mercedes had been trumped by a quicker car and it doesn’t bode well for Hamilton in the upcoming races.
“It will be very interesting to see what happens at the Italian GP,” said Wolff. “Ferrari had their worst weekend of the season there last year…”
The long straights of Monza should now suit the red cars and, as Mercedes has always struggled at Singapore, Vettel could cut further into Hamilton’s lead.
Leaving Spa the gap was just 17 points with 200 up for grabs over the next eight races. As the crews pack down and the travelling circus heads south to Milan, Ferrari will be relishing its home race this weekend…