Mercedes revealed the reason behind Nico Rosberg’s slow pit stop during Sunday’s German Grand Prix was due to a stopwatch malfunction.
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Australia’s Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo, front, and Dutch Red Bull driver Max Verstappen steer their cars during the German F1 Grand Prix in Hockenheim, Germany, Sunday, July 31, 2016.
The Briton’s lights-to-flag display of dominance, his sixth win from the last seven races, allowed him to extend his overall lead over Rosberg to 19 points.
And despite fighting his way back up to second Rosberg was hit again with a harsh five seconds penalty for over-aggressively passing Verstappen, dropping him back down to fourth at the end behind Hamilton, who finished 11 seconds ahead of Ricciardo with Verstappen third.
Ferrari’s first race following the departure of technical director James Allison ended with Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen finishing a distant fifth and sixth respectively, while Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg came seventh. “That guy is very talented and has speed and, on his day, I think he is unbeatable”, he said.
Lewis Hamilton may now be a sure bet to win his third consecutive world championship this year. “It’s still not enough because I’m not a race win ahead yet”, he said. All I can say is tomorrow I’m going to be on the beach, sipping on a pina colada and enjoying the sun! “19 points is not tough”, he said, but quickly added that it might take some time before he gets over a GP that went “completely wrong”.
But when the Mercedes driver pulled into the pits, he was stationary for eight seconds instead of the required five.
“It feels like only a couple weeks ago we were in Barcelona and I was 43 points behind thinking, “jeez, I might come away 50 points behind”.
There was no recovering from there, and Rosberg had to settle for fourth. “That will take me some time to digest”.
Verstappen, sitting alongside Hamilton after the race, drew on the defending champion’s experiences with Rosberg this season to suggest that it was the right decision to penalise Rosberg.
“Lewis doesn’t just seem strong in the recent grands prix, Lewis is strong, so there is a big difference”.
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Red Bull’s two-three finish put them into second place in the constructors’ standings.
