Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg of Germany celebrates with champagne while his team mate Lewis Hamilton runs off after the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix on the Marina Bay City Circuit Singapore, Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016.
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Wolff was delighted to see his drivers finish first and third after struggling at the circuit a year ago but race victor Nico Rosberg suffered an almighty scare from a fast-charging Daniel Ricciardo with fresher tyres in his Red Bull.
“It’s been an awesome weekend here in Singapore for me, already yesterday with the pole lap and then today with the great start”, Rosberg said. Obviously it was very hard to overtake, but at one point Hamilton made a mistake and I managed to pass him, then after the pit stop he got the position back.
“The whole auto was on the edge, it always is in Singapore”.
But the world champion pointed to the fact that he had already come back from a 43-point deficit to Rosberg after the first four races of the season as a reason for optimism. However, it was Max Verstappen’s slow start that not only ruined his prospects, but also caused the bottleneck resulting in the crash.
“The team put me on a three-stop at the end and it was fun”. “What it’s going to take for the momentum to change?” “I got a very good start and pulled alongside Valtteri [Bottas], but I didn’t see Nico’s [Hulkenberg] auto coming across the track until he was right in front of me, facing the wrong way”.
Rosberg held on in a tense last lap to take the chequered flag 0.4 seconds ahead of Ricciardo.
While Hamilton managed to leapfrog the Ferrari – after Mercedes caught the Italian team off-guard with a third pit stop – to claim his 99th podium finish, it is Rosberg who is now in charge of the championship.
“There was no point fighting with Fernando [Alonso] after his last stop: he was in a different race and I knew I couldn’t afford to destroy my tyres that early in the stint”. At the start of the third lap, race control checked three times with the clerk of the course to make sure the track was clear of people and debris.
“We’ve come very close this year on numerous occasions, but I’m not going to be disappointed”, said the Australian.
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Vettel finished a creditable fifth after having started at the back of the grid due to a technical malfunction in qualifying. “We gave it a good shot and got within half-a-second”. “At one point I thought we could get very close to the battle for third, but we lost a bit too much in the opening stage of the race, which was expected”.
