The race did come with some ups and downs though. It was all on from the 5 red lights when Vettel jumped Hamilton into Turn 1, and went straight into second. Then we saw Pastor Maldonado climb all the way from 12th, and make a series of (believe this) brilliant overtakes to look good in P7, before his he had problems with his rear wing, an ultimately had to retire. We all thought Toro Rosso were in the boxseat for some big points I Catalunya, but sadly the setup they had ran with had a big compromise of straight line speed for cornering ability. This meant both Sainz and Verstappen were ultimately robbed of points chances with the dangerously strong DRS zone on the start/finish straight, it was disappointing to see. Later on into the race, every Brit spilt there cup of tea when that rear left tire change didn't go according to plan for Lewis Hamilton, costing him valuable time to Sebastian Vettel ahead. It didn't matter too much or Vettel though as during the second round of pit stops, Ferrari made one the most silliest pit stop choices ever, and tried to get Vettel on a two stop, when a three stop was much quicker. This choice of strategy was risky, and really didn't pay off with a massive gap to Hamilton when Vettel finished in third. Rosberg lead the race comfortably through out, and we could see Lewis wasn't going to catch him towards the end of the race. So the focus went to the battle for fourth, the two Finns, Valtteri Bottas for Williams, being chased by Kimi Raikkonen in the Ferrari. Raikkonen choose the two stop strategy running with the primes in the middle stint, to have an attack on the options in the last stint, however as he closed onto the Williams, Bottas kept his cool and didn't miss many apex's, and with Kimi's tires starting to go off it was a brilliant display from Valtteri, and he earned Williams a solid fourth place.
One of the more shocking moments came when Fernando Alonso was coming into the pits for a stop, when his brakes failed, and he nearly ran down his front jack man, but thanks to the jack mans quick reactions to get out of the way, no one was hurt. A the commentator's talked about it, Lotus's Romain Grosjean came into the pits and did the same thing! This time his jack man was flung with the jack in hand, but he managed to land all fine, and keep the car jacked up, only making the pit stop a bit longer. He was later seen sitting in the garage with some ice on his nuts.
Overall a great race to watch an enjoy, and I'm pleased for Nico Rosberg that he is back in the fight! With the gap only 20 points now, hopefully Monaco can bring more good luck for Rosberg, perhaps reverse the roles of Singapore 2014?
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