Although Lewis Hamilton became the drivers champion of 2015 in Austin, Texas, Formula 1 has belonged to Nico Rosberg ever since.
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Hamilton was attempting a one-pit stop strategy and took the lead for ten laps.
Behind the two teammates, Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen converted his third place on the grid to a third podium of the season, with an impeccable drive to clinch fourth in the standings over compatriot Valtteri Bottas – who had a shocking race. So impressive was Vettl, it makes you wonder if the Mercedes would have had such an easy ride if Vettel had started in third, as he probably would have done had it not been for the error in qualifying.
The German is still waiting to secure that elusive first world title, however, judging on his form in the final three races of the season he will definitely be the man to beat at the start of 2016.
Daniel Ricciardo took sixth place Nico Hulkenberg, with Felipe Massa holding on to eighth ahead of, despite the Frenchman’s last lap push after going on to the super soft tyres for his final stint.
The Mercedes team’s one-two finish carried their points total to a record 703 for the season, more than the 701 they accumulated past year when the final race was awarded double points. Of course we’re aware of the threat from the red guys, and we don’t them to come too close, and we’ll give it everything over the winter. “Honestly, I don’t really understand it, but I came out 11 seconds behind”.
Hamilton’s comments followed his posturing at the Brazilian Grand Prix last time out when he bemoaned his inability to run a different strategy to that of Rosberg in a bid to get ahead in the race.
It is suspected that certain changes made to the auto after Mercedes’ disastrous Singapore Grand Prix may have left Hamilton more unhappy with it, but Wolff is not convinced that may be the only answer. “I said to my race engineer [Peter Bonnington], we really need to sit down to try to figure out how we are going to rectify this”.
Speaking to Sky Sports F1 a little later, Rosberg said: “To finish the season in such a manner, it’s been a special end to the year – to have found more performance through the season”.
He pitted after lap 41 but instead of switching to the softer option tyres for the last 14 laps – Vettel had gone onto the options two laps earlier and raced strongly to the end – Hamilton was fitted with another set of the harder prime tyres and stood no chance of making up the deficit. It’s been a good year.
“In hindsight, once Nico had pitted I would have backed off a bit and made those tyres go a lot longer”, Hamilton said. “I tried to get around that loss and tried to claw it back in some other ways of doing the setup, so it was about exploring this weekend, and we did it the best we could, with that exploring”.
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Sir Jackie Stewart, tied with Hamilton as Britain’s most successful driver with three titles, hopes Rosberg triumphs next year. The only non-finisher was Lotus’ Pastor Maldonado.
