Rosberg wins Spanish Grand Prix from Pole

As was expected, Nico Rosberg of Mercedes won the Spanish Grand Prix after starting from Pole position. It is extremely difficult to overtake in Spanish Grand Prix. So the pole position virtually assures the winner unless there is a problem with reliability of the car the driver has a momentary lapse of concentration. Neither of which occurred in Barcelona and Rosberg raced to victory. His teammate and F1 Championship leader Lewis Hamilton finished second. Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari finished third.

Lewis Hamilton’s only chance of overtaking Nico Rosberg was at the start of the race. However, Hamilton had too much wheel spin and not only he couldn’t challenge Rosberg, but also Sebastian Vettel overtook him. At that moment the thought of race victory perhaps overtook him. Whatever dreams of race victory he might have had, completely vanished when he had a tardy first pitstop. His mechanic couldn’t remove his left rear wheel nut and he had to stop for 5.2seconds. That was more than double the time Ferrari took for Vettel’s first pit stop. Sebastian Vettel had a 2.3 second pitstop. In comparison Rosberg’s pitstop was 2.5 seconds long. Mercedes put Hamilton in a 3 pit stop strategy and it helped him to overtake Sebastian Vettel.

Nico Rosberg finished 17.5 seconds ahead of Lewis Hamilton. Sebastian Vettel was a further 15 seconds behind Hamilton. It must have hurt Ferrari that its other driver Kimi Raikkonen couldn’t finish in fourth. Valtteri Bottas drove a strong race and Kimi couldn’t overtake him. Valtteri Bottas finished 12 seconds behind Vettel and Kimi was another 10 seconds behind Bottas. Felipe Massa finished another 8 seconds behind Kimi in 6th position. All other drivers were lapped atleast one lap.

Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull finished seventh and was lapped once. Romain Grosjean of Lotus was P8 followed by Carlos Sainz in P9 and Daniil Kvyat in P10.

Max Verstappen of Toro Rosso finished in 11th and outside the points paying positions. He was followed by Felipe Nasr of Sauber in 12th.

Sergio Perez of Force India was 13th and was followed by Marcus Ericsson of Sauber in 14th. Nico Hulkenberg of Force India was 15th and was followed by McLaren’s Jenson Button in 16th.

The two Manor Marussia racing cars of Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi came in last at 17th and 18th positions.

The Spanish crowd favourite Fernando Alonso retired in lap 26 due to brake failure. Infact during a pitstop he couldn’t stop at his mark and the jack flew after getting hit. Fortunately nothing major happened. One wonders if the double world champion did the right thing to make this move to McLaren. Some even doubt whether he will win a race again.

It was again a bad day in office for Pastor Maldonado. He was driving aggressively and was P7 at one point of time. However, he had a collision with his teammate and his rear wing was damaged. The resulting pitstop was a big setback and he couldn’t recover from it and had to retire on lap 45.

F1 Championship Race 2015

After the Spanish Grand Prix, the following is the F1 2015 Championship Race

Sl. No. Driver                         Team              Points

1.         Lewis Hamilton          Mercedes       111

2.         Nico Rosberg              Mercedes       91

3.         Sebastian Vettel         Ferrari            80

4.         Kimi Raikkonen         Ferrari            52

5.         Valtteri Bottas            Williams        42

6.         Felipe Massas             Williams        39

7.         Daniel Ricciardo        Red Bull         25

8.         Romain Grosjean       Lotus              16

9.         Felipe Nasr                Sauber            14

10.       Carlos Sainz              Toro Rosso     8

11.       Max Verstappen        Toro Rosso     6

12.       Nico Hulkenberg       Force India     6

13.       Sergio Perez              Force India     5

14.       Marcus Ericsson        Sauber            5

15.       Daniil Kvyat              Red Bull         5

16.       Fernando Alonso       McLaren         0

17.       Jenson Button            McLaren         0

18.       Roberto Merhi           Marussia         0

19.       Will Stevens              Marussia         0

20.       Pastor Maldonado     Lotus               0