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.
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Nico Rosberg hung on for the narrowest Formula One victory for six years to win the Singapore Grand Prix on Sunday, celebrating his 200th career start in flawless style as he reclaimed the championship lead from his Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton.
It was a far cry from just 12 months ago when Hamilton retired and Rosberg trailed in fourth, hopelessly and inexplicably off the pace on Marina Bay street circuit.
“It has been an awesome weekend in Singapore for me”, he added.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff also weighed in with his thoughts as well as the race victor Nico Rosberg.
The German, who started Sunday’s race in pole position, had to withstand a late surge from Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo to eventually claim the victory by precisely 0.488 seconds.
Triple world champion Hamilton completed the podium in third place.
Rosberg’s third successive win, and first in Singapore, took him back to the top of the drivers’ championship, eight points ahead of Hamilton with six races left.
Ricciardo is third on 179 points ahead of Sebastian Vettel on 153. My start was not good, then there was the accident so I took it a bit easy; most important, the vehicle was still intact, but after the restart it was tricky to get the tires working, I was on the primes, I lost quite a lot of time behind the Sauber, it was quite tough to get past, but then it was important to survive until we fitted the last set of Ultrasofts at the end, where we really could unfold the pace.
“At that moment we concentrated on getting Lewis back to third but equally I think that Ricciardo or Red Bull at that stage thought about pitting him. I’m still in the fight and I’m going to give it everything I’ve got”.
There was drama at the start as Nico Hulkenberg hit Carlos Sainz’s Toro Rosso and careered across the track before smashing into the pit lane wall and bringing out the safety auto.
His night then got worse after he slipped behind Raikkonen following a mistake at turn 10 which enabled the Finn to pass him at the ensuing corner.
Having dodged a lizard in practice, the other Red Bull of Max Verstappen did even better to dodge a race-start pile-up when the Force India of Nico Hulkenberg was shunted in front of Verstappen by the two Toro Rossos.
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There were no more safety cars, throughout a 61-lap race that has yet to be completed without one, but the different tyre strategies of the leading cars made for a tactical and exciting race on a circuit that offers very few overtaking opportunities.
