Nico Rosberg became only the fourth driver in Formula One history to record seven successive wins when he cruised to victory ahead of Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton in yesterday’s incident-filled Russian Grand Prix.
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All, bar Rosberg, were title winners but he is well on the way with a 43-point lead over triple champion, team mate Lewis Hamilton, who suffered power unit problems in both qualifying and the race, with 17 races remaining.
A water-pressure issue stopped Hamilton hunting down Rosberg in the latter stages of the race, leaving him happy just to have finished.
Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen was fourth in qualifying, followed by Bottas’ Williams teammate, Felipe Massa, and Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo.
On a cool day at the Sochi Autodrom, all six drivers and cars from the Renault, Sauber and Manor teams were eliminated at the end of the Q1 session topped by Hamilton ahead of Rosberg and then the two Ferraris.
“First of all, of course we don’t do it deliberately”, Wolff said after Sunday’s race in Russian Federation. My response is I don’t even want to ignore this bunch of lunatics who think that we would harm a driver, who is our driver, who has been a double World Champion for us.
Asked how the Mercedes crew felt about sabotage accusations, Wolff replied: “The reason why I’m being vocal about it is that I want to protect those guys because they’re being hit by comments that are just inexcusable and unfair – abusive without any reason”.
“There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that I couldn’t win it, I had the pace”, said Hamilton.
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His luck was better that Sebastian Vettel, who was spectacularly bounced out on the first lap after being hit twice by Daniil Kvyat, racing in his home Grand Prix. Hamilton, who appeared downcast after the race, said later that he would never give up in defence of his crown and meant to fight all the way. Instead he tries to go through him, and the Ferrari driver is out of the race. I really enjoyed it. I kept concentrating, pushing fast. “At that time, I was lapping a little quicker than Nico, I was chewing away at (his lead)”, said Hamilton, adding he had no idea how serious the problem with his vehicle was. I don’t dislike him (Kvyat), but I think he did a mistake two weeks ago, he made a mistake today but it doesn’t help me now. It’s unusual for them – the majority were on Nico’s auto last year and Nico’s (current) guys were with me for three years.
