Brazilian GP: Rosberg from pole to victory!

I was hoping to see a colourful race but destiny decided otherwise. However, there was some drama before the start as Sainz´s Toro Rosso came to a halt on the pit lane and the Spaniard´s STR10 had to be towed back to the pits. This meant Sainz had to start to the race from the pit lane. And the race did have a promising start as Bottas from P7 had a staggering start. The Finn took an aggressive line on the right and made his way past Kvyat´s RB11 and Hulkenberg´s Force India. Once again Bottas came very close to Kimi in the first corners but this time there was luckily no contact between the Finns. Rosberg maintained his lead with his team-mate Hamilton following him closely. Sebastian was third and Kimi fourth. Sainz´s problems continued and his car stopped on the track already on the opening lap. Sainz parked his STR10 quite dangerously but surprisingly safety car wasn´t deployed. Luckily no one lost control of his car until the marshals managed to move the car away! Potentially there could have been a chance for a serious accident...

Already on the opening laps of the race it was obvious that the Ferrari duo couldn´t match Mercedes´ pace. As obvious was the fact that Bottas in his Williams was unable to take the battle to the Ferrari duo. Pit stop roulette started already on lap 11 when Kvyat, Massa and Hulkenberg pitted. Bottas pitted a lap later for a fresh set of prime tyres and rejoined the track in P10. A couple of laps later both the Ferrari duo and the Mercedes duo made their pit stops. After the first pit stops top four remained unchanged: Rosberg was leading the race with Hamilton second, Sebastian third and Kimi fourth. Hamilton was almost within DRS distance from his team-mate but couldn´t quite get close enough to make any move on his team-mate. Sebastian was already 6 seconds off Hamilton and Kimi had a 10-second gap to his team-mate.

However, overtaking turned out to be possible for some drivers. Verstappen made a staggering overtaking move on Force India´s Perez and made it up to P9. There´s something magical about this young rookie´s driving. He seems to be capable of things that others aren´t... And this wasn´t the Dutchman´s only overtaking move in the race. Later on in the race he repeated his overtaking move against Sauber´s Nasr. It was utterly entertaining to watch how this young man drove his STR10 at Interlagos.

Sebastian pitted already on lap 32 for a fresh set of soft tyres, which revealed that the German was on a 3-stop strategy. Mercedes had to match Ferrari´s strategy so Rosberg and Hamilton pitted on the following laps. Both Mercedes drivers opted for white-marked medium tyres. Kimi´s tyres were much older than his team-mate´s so the Iceman didn´t even try to prevent Sebastian from overtaking him. Bottas pitted not until on lap 42 for the second time and rejoined the track in the familiar P5. There was already a massive 45-second gap to his countryman Kimi in P4. Kimi pitted on lap 47 for a fresh set of medium tyres, which was meant to last til the end of the race. Sebastian pitted a lap later for the third time and opted for medium tyres. Once again the Mercedes duo pitted right after Sebastian. Their tyre choice was similar to Sebastian´s.

Although Hamilton was only a couple of seconds behind Rosberg there was no battle for the victory at Interlagos. Rosberg took his second consecutive victory and once again Hamilton had to settle for being the runner-up. Sebastian completed the podium with his team-mate fourth. Bottas who finished fifth got lapped by Rosberg on the final lap! Quite shocking how huge the gaps evolved during the race! Hulkenberg in his Force India finished 6th and Red Bull´s Kvyat 7th. Massa finished 8th on his home soil but after the race the Brazilian was excluded from the standings due to exceeding the maximum tyre temperature in terms of his rear right tyre. That meant Grosjean finished 8th, Verstappen 9th and Maldonado rounded out the top ten.

I was happy to see Sebastian on the podium although I was hoping that Ferrari would have been closer to Mercedes in the race. It would have been so perfect to see both Sebastian and Kimi celebrating on the podium! Now there´s only the final round of the season left! Feels kind of bittersweet already. Luckily there´s still one more GP weekend to enjoy this season. Can´t wait for Abu Dhabi as the venue is absolutely outstanding and breathtaking!