Meanwhile, Daniel Ricciardo won the inter-team Red Bull battle, securing the runners-up spot, 6.9secs off Hamilton, and 6.5secs up on Max Verstappen in the sister auto, despite dropping behind the Dutchman at the start.
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At Hockenheim over the weekend, Hamilton (who started second) stormed past Nico Rosberg and romped home to victory, managing to secure a 19-point lead.
Rosberg surrendered his lead from pole to the Briton, who stormed away to claim his sixth win in seven races and strengthen his grip in the title chase.
British rookie Jolyon Palmer started 14th and made three places off the start-line, but a clumsy collision with Felipe Massa on the opening lap, saw him drop to last, and he ended the race only 19th.
Daniel Ricciardo was second, ahead of Red Bull teammate Max Verstappen, the first time these two Red Bull drivers shared the podium. Red Bull pushed past Ferrari into second place in the constructors’ standings.
Rosberg, who had looked unbeatable after topping every practice session, was only fourth after falling back at thestart and collecting a five-second time penalty for forcing Verstappen off the track. Speaking to Sky afterwards, he expressed surprise at the penalty: “It was a really tough one today for sure”.
In front of a big race-day crowd who had come to see Rosberg grab back the title lead, it was Hamilton who was to seize the initiative from the off. “I hope I’ll be able to get a race win ahead and then I’ll feel like I am ahead”. Finishing fourth was down to the penalty. “No, as I’m not a race win ahead yet”, he said.
“So I was really optimistic and thinking that I can bring it home today so just really disappointed that everything went wrong”. Being 19 points behind Lewis now is not tough – tough is losing the race in the way that I did.
“I didn’t know. It just felt like I was sitting there forever”, Rosberg, who finished fourth, said of the team malfunction.
“I don’t think I could’ve challenged the Red Bulls after the penalty”, he said.
Verstappen took to the runoff area to avoid Rosberg and instantly complained on the radio that he had been forced off, an opinion the stewards agreed with.
“I’m very disappointed because I had an awesome qualifying and I was feeling good”.
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Rosberg won the first four races of 2016, besting pole-sitter Hamilton off the line in Australia and Bahrain as the reigning drivers’ champion was let down by his launch.
