Hamilton coasts to inaugural Russian Grand Prix win

Lewis Hamilton started on pole however his teammate Nico Rosberg who started second did his best to overtake Lewis. Rosberg ran wide and took lot of speed to turn 2 to overtake Lewis Hamilton. However, he also flat spotted his tyres and had to pit for changing his tyres.

The Sochi International Street circuit hosting the Russian F1 Grand Prix had a clean and smooth surface so tyre degradation was less. The cold climate also helped in lowering the tyre degradation. However expecting one set of tyres to last 51 laps was ambitious to say the least. Nevertheless the Mercedes team kept of telling Rosberg that he can get the third and final podium position by beating Jenson Button. It initially seemed that it was more to do to keep Rosberg's motivation up. When Rosberg started complaining that he is having tyre degradation by lap 22, it appeared that he has to pit again. However there was a bit of racing as Rosberg upped his pace and even overtook Valtteri Bottas for the second position on lap 31 and he confirmed that his tyres have become better. However, Williams team told Bottas that they were confident that Rosberg can't make the tyres last for such a long time. Rosberg continued to lap faster than every other driver till lap 39 and had opened a gap of about 5 seconds. Valtteri Bottas did a late charge but couldn't overtake Nico Rosberg. After the silly move in the opening lap which resulted in the flat spotting of tyres, Rosberg used his head and drove a great race to secure the second position.

The overall race was a bit dull, except for the superior pace of the Mercedes which helped in Rosberg come back from the grid to P2. Otherwise it was mostly a procession as the tyre degradation was minimal and didn't act as a variable.

Valtteri Bottas of Williams came third. Jenson Button of McLaren did a good race to finish 4th. He is at the moment not sure if he can find a race seat next year in a good car. His teammate Kevin Magnusses came in 5th followed by Fernando Alonso of Ferrari in 5th. Then came the Red Bull duo of Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel in 7th and 8th positions. Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari scored 9th and was followed by Sergio Perez in 10th and last points paying position.

The Caterham team confirmed that Kamui Kobayashi's brakes were overheating so he had to retire after 22 laps in Russian F1 Grand Prix. The lone Marussia of Max Chilton had earlier retired after 10 laps.

Results in Russian F1 Grand Prix 2014

1. Lewis Hamilton         Mercedes
2. Nico Rosberg            Williams
3. Valtteri Bottas            McLaren
4. Jenson Button            Mercedes
5. Kevin Magnussen      McLaren
6. Fernando Alonso       Ferrari
7. Daniel Ricciardo        RedBull
8. Sebastian Vettel         RedBull
9. Kimi Raikkonen         Ferrari
10. Sergio Perez             Force India
11. Felipe Massa            Williams
12. Nico Hulkenberg      Force India
13. Jean-Eric Vergne      Toro Rosso
14. Danil Kvyat              Toro Rosso
15. Esteban Gutierrez     Sauber
16. Adrian Sutil              Sauber
17. Romain Grosjean      Lotus
18. Pastor Maldonado     Lotus
19. Marcus Ericsson       Caterham

Retirements in Russian F1 Grand Prix 2014

Kamui Kobayashi              Caterham        Lap 22
Max Chilton                       Marussia         Lap 10