Leaders gambled away badly: rain chaos washed away Norris and Hamilton to victory

The leader gambled away badly
Rain chaos washes away Norris and Hamilton to victory

In Sochi, the rain comes late and turns a Formula 1 race almost on its head. While Lewis Hamilton pits, Lando Norris stays out in the lead. When the rain gets heavier, McLaren loses the bet and the world champion wins. Max Verstappen also benefits tremendously.

With his 100th Grand Prix victory, Lewis Hamilton raced spectacularly back to the top of Formula 1 in the increasing rain in Sochi. After a late tire change, the Mercedes superstar caught the long-time leading McLaren driver Lando Norris and celebrated the next milestone in his exceptional career at the Russian Grand Prix. Behind the 36-year-old, title challenger Max Verstappen, who had to start from the back because of an engine change, came in second thanks to a splendid race to catch up in the Red Bull. Third place went to Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz.

Norris had “made no mistakes, then the rain came,” said Hamilton, who is two points ahead of Verstappen with seven races still to go: “I’m very grateful for the points.” And Verstappen said happily: “I didn’t expect such a result before the race.”

With seven races still to go, Hamilton is now very thin with two points ahead of Verstappen and has the best chances of his eighth drivers’ title. Ex-world champion Sebastian Vettel came in only twelfth in the Aston Martin and missed the points for the fourth time in a row. Mick Schumacher retired after a little more than half due to a defect in his Haas car.

Hamilton went into qualifying as a big favorite, but was not expected to play this role due to his own mistakes and was only able to start from fourth place. At the start he even fell back to seventh place, while Sainz immediately took the lead. The Spaniard had finished second behind pole man Norris in a crazy qualifying session. The duo held up at the beginning as well as Williams super talent George Russell in third.

After his engine penalty, Verstappen had to laboriously work his way forward. The seven-time winner of the season went on the high-speed course in 20th place. Overtaking maneuvers are difficult in Sochi, but Verstappen skillfully used his superior car to quickly make up positions. Just like the Dutchman, vice-world champion Valtteri Bottas, among others, changed their engines in the Mercedes and Ferrari star Charles Leclerc and were punished for having already used more than three drives.

The four-time world champion Vettel was stuck in midfield and had to defend himself in eleventh place early on against Verstappen, who quickly passed. The lead changed on the 14th lap: Norris, who two weeks ago finished second behind Daniel Ricciardo in the sensational McLaren one-two, gave his ex-team-mate Sainz no chance. “Got it,” Norris radioed to the pits. While the youngster did not have to stop, the pursuers changed their tires.

Sochi record winner Hamilton was more than nine seconds behind Norris after a third of the race, Verstappen rushed up from behind. Verstappen was only five points ahead of the 15th round of the season. Halfway through the race, Hamilton was second twelve seconds behind Norris, while Verstappen couldn’t get past old master Fernando Alonso for a longer time in fifth.

The title rivals Verstappen and Hamilton then drove almost simultaneously to change tires on the 27th of 53 laps, followed by Norris two laps later. “You can win the race,” said Toto Wolff, Head of Motorsport at Mercedes, to Hamilton over the radio. At this point, the Silver Arrows superstar was working his way up to Norris second by second, keeping Verstappen at a distance.

At the front it got more and more exciting, at the end of the field nothing worked for Schumacher. His racing team asked the 22-year-old to park the car in the garage due to a technical defect. At this point the rookie was in penultimate place.

Verstappen could not keep up at the beginning of the final phase and fell back to seventh place for the time being, Hamilton showed one fastest lap after the other and came close to Norris. For his part, the youngster countered with best times – then it got dramatic. The onset of rain made it slippery. Shortly before the end of the race, Norris went off the track twice, and Hamilton changed tires. That was the key to victory. Norris did not want to change his tires and was severely punished for it. He crossed the finish line in seventh place, disappointed.

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