Nico Rosberg will begin the 2016 Belgian Grand Prix on pole position as he looks to close the gap on world championship leader Lewis Hamilton.
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World champion Hamilton benefited from a chaotic start and a safety auto period caused by a heavy crash by Renault’s Kevin Magnussen, who was taken to hospital with an ankle injury, to rescue an unlikely podium place.
Australian Daniel Ricciardo finished second in his Red Bull.
The Briton has always been aware he would have to take engine-related penalties at some point this year after suffering a spate of reliability woes earlier in the season.
With the tyre barrier destroyed, the race was then suspended with further repairs carried out.
Sunday’s victory is Rosberg’s 20th of his F1 career and he is now ranked second in the F1 standings, with 223 points, just nine points behind Leader Hamilton.
It was the fifth of seven rounds of the 1950 World Drivers’ Championship.
“The opposition was unusually close this weekend, not eventually in the race, but up to that they were very close”.
The Dane lost control of his vehicle as he crested the fast uphill sweep of the Eau Rouge corner and slammed violently into the barriers.
The sport held its breath with Magnussen’s vehicle buried in the wall, but the Dane was able to walk away from his destroyed Renault albeit with a limp. Contact between the two Ferrari’s and Max Verstappen left Sebastian Vettel facing the wrong way while Kimi Raikkonen and Verstappen were forced to pit with damage.
“If someone had said ‘You’re going to lose 10 points and take three new engines, are you OK with that?’ I’d have said I’d take it, so I’m very happy with it”.
“That was flawless for me”, said Hamilton, victor of six of the last seven races leading up to Spa.
“That’s not what I was focusing on”, said Rosberg.
However, Hamilton believes that having fresh engines to see out the remainder of the season means he can push them harder than he was able to earlier in the year.
Mexican Sergio Perez was sixth ahead of his Force India teammate Nico Hulkenberg, Valtteri Bottas of Williams, Jenson Button of McLaren Honda and Felipe Massa of Williams.
Hamilton completed just four laps in the first stage of qualifying in order to ensure he was eligible to start the race, while avoiding eating into tires that have been suffering all weekend in the intense heat at Spa.
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Considering the next race is the Italian GP in Monza – Ferrari’s home race – Verstappen will have the crowd against him.
