Vettel stuns Hamilton to win Australian Grand Prix
Ricciardo fights back from penalty to claim fourth place.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel has left arch-rival Lewis Hamilton
and his Mercedes-AMG team scratching their heads after pulling off a stunning Australian Grand Prix victory.
Hamilton started from pole position and looked comfortable
out front for the opening stint of the race, with Kimi Raikkonen, in the second Ferrari, running behind the reigning world champion and ahead of his teammate Vettel.
Both Hamilton and Raikkonen made early pitstops, on laps 19
and 20 respectively, and looked set to maintain their advantage at the front of the field. That was until the Haas-Ferrari of Romain Grosjean stopped on the track with a loose wheel on lap 25, creating a Virtual Safety Car period; whereby each car is restricted
to a speed limit by race officials.
That allowed Vettel, who had yet to stop for fresh tyres, to inherit the lead of the race, to pit and gain a slight advantage because of the pitlane’s higher speed limit, jumping Hamilton in the process and taking command of the race.
The position swap left Hamilton questioning his crew what happened
on the radio for him to lose his once strong grasp on the race. But despite his pace in the Mercedes-AMG he was unable to find a way to overtake around the tight Albert Park layout and ultimately finished five seconds behind the Ferrari at the chequered
flag.
“Obviously we were a bit lucky with the safety car but we’ll
take it,” Vettel admitted on the podium.
Hamilton was left to rue the costly error by him and his team
during the safety car period but paid credit to his rival afterwards.
“Today they did the better job,” Hamilton said.
Local hero Daniel Ricciardo narrowly missed out on visiting
the podium, finishing in fourth place in a dogged pursuit of Raikkonen in the post-safety car period of the race. Despite missing out on the podium it was still an impressive recovery from the Australian Red Bull driver following his controversial Friday practice
penalty that saw him relegated from fifth place on the grid to eighth.
As he vowed pre-race, Ricciardo pushed hard from the beginning
and benefitted from a scrappy day from teammate Max Verstappen, which included an unassisted spin, and the retirement of both Haas cars.
Indeed the American Haas team was the hard luck story of the
day. Both Kevin Magnussen and teammate Grosjean looked set for strong finishes, potentially fourth and fifth, but were both halted on-track after a problem with securing the wheels at their pitstops.
Fernando Alonso finished in fifth, ahead of Verstappen, in
a strong performance by the new Renault-powered McLaren. His teammate, Stoffel Vandoorne, finished ninth to secure a double-points finish for the British team that has struggled so badly with reliability the past three seasons using Honda engines.
Renault also got both of its cars home inside the top 10, Nico
Hulkenberg managing seventh place and Carlos Sainz in 10th.
The championship next moves to Bahrain on April 8.
Australian Grand Prix results
1. Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari
2. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes-AMG
3. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari
4. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull-Renault
5. Fernando Alonso, McLaren-Renault
6. Max Verstappen, Red Bull-Renault
7. Nico Hulkenberg, Renault
8. Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes-AMG
9. Stoffel Vandoorne, McLaren-Renault
10. Carlos Sainz, Renault
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