Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton has continued his championship comeback by winning the Mexican Grand Prix for the first time in his career.
Hamilton controlled the race from pole and led the majority of the 71-lap race to beat Nico Rosberg by 8.3s to win back-to-back races for the third time in 2016 after chains of wins in Monaco and Canada, and in Austria, Britain, Hungary and Germany.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel joined the Mercedes pair on the podium dramatically as Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was given a five-second time penalty while preparing to go onto the podium. The German ran through the pit lane on his way to standing on a podium for the first since the Italian Grand Prix.
The win leaves just two countries, Azerbaijan and Brazil, on the current calendar in which Hamilton has failed to win at so far in his 10 seasons in Formula One.
It is Hamilton’s 51st win in the sport, putting him level in second place in the all-time placings with Alain Prost, 40 behind Michael Schumacher’s all-time record. He has reached 51 in seven fewer starts, with Hamilton achieving it in his 186th start, while Prost’s final win came in his 193rd start at the 1993 German Grand Prix for Williams.
He now sits just 19 points behind teammate Nico Rosberg with two rounds to go in Brazil and Abu Dhabi. Rosberg now has a total of 349 points in the Drivers’ Championship, the most in one season in his career, with Hamilton moving onto 330.
The start of the race was dramatic and would have had all Mercedes personnel sweating as both of their cars visited the grass at the first corner.
Hamilton had a massive lock-up in the lead and went massively off track, keeping his position, while Nico Rosberg cut the corner after Max Verstappen slightly touched the right-hand side of his car to avoid any potential of a collision.
After a later investigation, neither Rosberg or Verstappen was penalised by the stewards for being in the wrong. Both cars were fine to continue, although Hamilton later checked about vibrations on his tyres.
“We’re not super concerned, Lewis,” Pete Bonnington informed Hamilton. “It’s definitely going to be hard,” Hamilton replied.
Further down the order, Haas’ Esteban Gutierrez, Sauber’s Marcus Ericsson and Manor’s Pascal Wehrlein were all involved in an incident which saw Wehrlein retire from the race.
The Manor car had significant front left corner damage and was left stranded at turn one as the Virtual Safety Car and the Safety Car both appeared. No further action was also taken by the stewards over this racing incident.
Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz was the only driver to receive a penalty, a five-second time penalty, after being adjudged to have forced McLaren’s Fernando Alonso off track as both drivers came through the first corner and headed to turn two. Sainz and Alonso were battling for tenth place, something they were doing for much of the first stint of the race.
The Safety Car only appeared until the end of lap three, but Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo decided to switch up his strategy nevertheless. After starting on a different strategy to use supersofts and failing to get up the order from fourth place, dropping behind Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg into fifth, he decided to pit onto mediums and he came out in 17th place.
During this period, Hamilton led Rosberg, Verstappen, Hulkenberg, Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, Williams’ Felipe Massa, Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel, Williams’ Valtteri Bottas, Force India’s Sergio Perez and Sainz in the top ten.
Hamilton continued to extend his gap out in front from 1.4s at lap six to 5.5s on lap 17. Rosberg had been involved in a battle with Verstappen for second as the Red Bull driver threatened on his supersoft tyres.
The Dutch driver was at one point within the one-second gap for DRS, however, his supersoft tyres quickly gave up by lap 12, where he fell 2.3s behind Rosberg.
Massa had got ahead of Vettel under the opening drama of the race, and the German driver complained as he couldn’t find a way past the Brazilian. “I’m a bit stuck,” Vettel said, before declaring that Massa was “stupid” for not letting him past.
Hamilton continued his lead until lap 17 when he pitted from supersofts onto the mediums, which were the preferred the race tyre. He remained ahead of teammate Rosberg when he also pitted three laps later.
Vettel led the race between laps 21 and the start of lap 33 after extending his stint on soft tyres, but would relinquish the lead by pitting on lap 33, returning the lead to the English driver.
The race settled down for the final half with just a few flashpoints and interesting events, and some drivers being unable to pass each other.
Perez remained behind Massa in tenth place despite spending a lot of time picturing the gearbox of the Williams car in front of them as the two teams continued to battle each other on track rather than the championship standings.
Both Raikkonen and Ricciardo decided to pit again for new medium and soft tyres respectively on laps 46 and 51. The Finn had previously complained about his previous set of tyres, saying that his grip was ‘poor’.
Another dramatic moment came on lap 50 as Verstappen tried to lunge Rosberg after the German locked up behind traffic. He moved within 0.3s behind him and tried a move, going wide and losing time off track, falling around 2s behind him later after the attempted overtaking manoeuvre.
Hamilton took the chequered flag at the end of lap 71 to finally triumph at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez ahead of Rosberg and Verstappen, although the latter was quickly penalised.
Verstappen was told to let Vettel past by his own team on track after having a massive lock-up and cutting a corner in front of the German, but chose to stay ahead while the German became frustrated in the final few laps.
“Move, move, for BLEEP sake. He’s a BLEEP, that’s what he is,” Vettel said over Verstappen’s decision. Vettel continued to swear many times until the end of the race.
Vettel also said over team radio that he was being pushed back into the clutches of the other Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo and the two almost collided dramatically. The two somehow stayed out of each other’s way with superb driving despite the cars appearing to touch twice after the Australian locked up.
Verstappen’s decision meant that both drivers behind were within five seconds of him and a post-race penalty promoted the two into third and fourth place, pushing him down to fifth in the final classification.
Meanwhile, Hulkenberg triumphed in the Force India-Williams battle to take seventh ahead of Bottas, Massa and Perez.
Ericsson took his best finishing position of the season so far to finish 11th ahead of McLaren’s Jenson Button and Alonso.
Both McLarens got past Renault’s Jolyon Palmer in the last ten laps after the Renault driver going over 60 laps on one set of mediums after changing tyres under the safety car period.
Sauber’s Felipe Nasr was 15th, with Sainz 16th, Renault’s Kevin Magnussen 17th, and Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat 18th.
Haas’ Esteban Gutierrez and Romain Grosjean continued to struggle around the Mexican track, finishing ahead of only Manor’s Esteban Ocon.
Ocon’s teammate Pascal Wehrlein was the only retirement of the race after failing to get past the first turn, being unable to convert a great qualifying into a great race finish.
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