Vettel wins dramatic race - no Mercedes in podium at Hungary

Sebastian Vettel wins dramatic Hungarian Grand Prix with Mercedes cars not in podium

The Hungarian F1 Grand Prix 2015 had plenty of drama.

Sebastian Vettel won a dramatic, accident ridden race with Daniil Kvyat and Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull coming second and third. Max Verstappen came 4th. Fernando Alonso of McLaren was 5th. Pole sitter Lewis Hamilton came in sixth. Romain Grojsean of Lotus was 7th. Nico Rosberg of Mercedes was 8th and was followed by Jenson Button of McLaren in 9th. Marcus Ericsson of Sauber was 10th.

In an emotionally surcharged moment, all drivers observed silence and stood around the helmet of Jules Bianchi to mourn his death.

After that the drivers gathered to start the race but there was an aborted start as Felipe Massa was found to be too short of this starting grid.

After that there was still lot of drama when the race started. At the starting of the race Sebastian Vettel had a clean getaway from the starting blocks and lead the race and was followed by his teammate Kimi Raikkonen. Nico Rosberg was third followed by Pole sitter Hamilton in 4th. Hamilton complained that “Nico crossed over my line there, pushed me wide”. Hamilton put a wheel on the gravel and was down to 10th. After this it appeared that Hamilton’s hope of winning the Hungarian Grand Prix for the 5th time was up in smoke. Especially since he was stuck behind the Williams of Felipe Massa for a long time. Then finally Lewis Hamilton overtook Felipe Massa and was quickly behind the tail of 8th placed Sergio Perez of Force India. In Lap 12 he could finally overtake Sergio Perez for 8th. By then Hamilton was already 30 seconds down on Sebastian Vettel.

Nico Rosberg in the initial moments of the race, despite not winning, would have been happy as Hamilton went down to 10th. In a circuit notorious for the difficulty in overtaking, Lewis Hamilton came back from 10th in the grid to 5th by Lap 15. Ofcourse, he was also helped by Valttteri Bottas and Kvyat making their first pitstop. Lewis Hamilton might be feeling tensed as he asked “You are very quiet Bono”. He was then asked to push and immediately Hamilton upped his pace.

In lap 19 Pastor Maldonado of Lotus and Sergio Perez of Force India collided. This incident was investigated and Maldonado was handed a drive through penalty for causing the accident.


In lap 20 Hamilton pit and took soft tyres. In lap 21 Rosberg pit and took medium tyres. So Mercedes changed the strategy for both the drivers.

However, for Hamilton it was a bit unfortunate that he was again stuck behind Daniel Ricciardo who just emerged ahead of him after the pit stop. Ricciardo had taken medium tyres and had kept the soft tyres to charge during the last stages of the race. Hamilton overtook Ricciardo in Lap 29. He actually told Mercedes that “I’am so close. Can I have one more lap or not”? Mercedes agreed and Hamilton overtook Ricciardo for 4th. Interestingly Hamilton, despite having the same soft tyres as Vettel and having changed tyres one lap earlier was driving nearly a second faster than Vettel. However, Vettel then upped his pace and Hamilton started managing his tyres and he was told to make the maximum of his current stint so that he can only have a short stint with the medium tyres which is slower.

In Lap 43 Nico Hulkenberg of Force India has a big shunt and hit the walls to bring the safety car. Hulkenberg’s wing seemed to break off and then he had a big lock-up and hit the walls. It is a big failure that Force India has to analyse.

Both Hamilton and Nico Rosberg dived into the pits along with many other drivers. Both Hamilton and Rosberg chose medium tyres and get ready to race with the Ferraris as in one stroke all the lead of the Ferraris vanished. Unfortunately for Kimi Raikkonen he had a MGU-K power failure just before the safety car and had to deal with that loss for the rest of the race. Unfortunately, Lewis Hamilton and Daniel Ricciardo made contact after the restart and Hamilton started dropping back fast. He had to make a pit stop to change the nose and put on soft tyres hoping that he will again manage to overtake a few cars to limit the damage to his World Championship race. However Hamilton was handed a drive through penalty for the incident with Daniel Ricciardo.

Nico Rosberg and Daniel Ricciardo sped past Kimi Raikkonen as without MGU-K power, Raikkonen was a sitting duck and soon Raikkonen retired.

It was soon upto Nico Rosberg to overtake Sebastian Vettel for the first place. However, with 5 laps left in the race Daniel Ricciardo hit Nico Rosberg and caused a puncture just when Rosberg was barely a second behind Vettel. This ensured that Nico Rosberg fell behind Hamilton. Ricciardo also came to the pits for a new nose. This ensured that for the first time in the last two years, neither of the Mercedes cars were in the podium in a race.

The Nico Rosberg-Daniel Ricciardo incident was investigated by the stewards.

Results of 2015 Hungarian F1 Grand Prix

Jules Bianchi dies after 9 months in coma

Jules Bianchi passes away after 9 months in coma

Jules Bianchi, had a massive accident in Suzuka in October 2014. Since that day he had been in Coma. However, his family informed that today his battle came to an end. "Jules fought right to the very end, as he always did, but today his battle came to an end. The pain we feel is immense and indescribable".

Jules Bianchi was a promising driver and he was driving for Marussia. He had got 2 points in Monaco, the only points by Marussia till date. The bonus due to the 9 place and 2points earned by Jules Bianchi helped the team remain afloat whereas Caterham winded up. Marussia later went into administration in 2014 and could successfully come out of it and race in 2015 as Manor racing.

Jules Bianchi had crashed into a recovery vehicle which was extracting the crashed vehicle of Adrian Sutil. The rain and extreme low light had made visibility very poor and Jules crashed into the back of the recovery vehicle. A FIA internal report had stated that Jules didn't sufficiently slow down and his speed was 126 kmph. Many had felt the delay due to rains and subsequent low light had made the race virtually un-driveable. Unfortunately, the stewards decided to continue with the race and the consequences are there for all to see.

Jules Bianchi was a bright young driver who would have one day driven for Ferrari. He was honing his craft in Marussia and getting ready to move to the bigger team. Unfortunately, he was cruelly taken away from us at such a young age.

A man in coma for so long needs top notch care for a long long time before one can expect him to recover. The initial medical support immediately after the impact is very important and decides the extent of injury and the recovery period, if any. It may be pertinent to mention that Michael Schumacher is still recovering from Coma. Michael Schumacher had lot of money achieved during his phenomenally successful career. He is a billionnnaire. However, a few months back his wife had to sell off his private jet and his holiday home. Jules Bianchi being a young lad and at just starting out in a lowly team, his family would have found the medical costs unnerving. Unfortunately, we don't hear FIA or anyone else coming to help Jules Bianchi's family to lessen the financial burden.

Manor racing tweeted "We are devastated to lose Jules after such a hard-fought battle. It was a privilege to have him to race for our team.

F1 is an inherently dangerous sport. However, the safety factors have improved. Despite that, it was criminal negligence in conducting a race in poor visibility. I hope Formula 1 and FIA learn their lessons from this incident. Will they?

Hamilton wins red-flagged Japanese F1 Grand Prix

Lewis Hamilton overtook Nico Rosberg in lap 29 in spectacular fashion to lead the race till it was red-flagged in lap 47 when Jules Bianchi crashed.

Jules Bianchi of Marussia crashed into a recovery vehicle which had been deployed after Adrian Sutil's crash. Bianchi suffered severe head injuries and has undergone head surgery. The result was backdated to lap 44. Aware about the extent of injuries to Jules Bianchi there was no celebration on the podium by winner Lewis Hamilton, second placed Nico Rosberg and third placed Sebastian Vettel. There were no champagnes opened and the stony face of the drivers reflected the severity of the incident.

The weather reports indicated that the Japanese F1 Grand Prix will have massive rains. Accordingly FIA had given the option to hold the race earlier in the day. However fearing cancellation by spectators, the race organisers decided to hold it on the scheduled time. So the race was started under safety car and the visibility was extremely poor. The safety car period ended in lap 9 and normal racing began. However, the spray from the cars ahead made it difficult for the drivers.

Daniel Ricciardo of RedBull finished 4th behind his teammate Vettel. He was followed by Jenson Button of McLaren in 5th. It was a good performance from Jenson Button whose seat for next year is in doubt.

Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa of Williams came in 6th and 7th. Nico Hulkenberg of Force India finished on 8th.

Jean-Eric Vergne of Toro Rosso who doesn't have a race seat next year finished on 9th. He was followed by Sergio Perez of Force India on 10th.

Kvyat of Toro Rosso finished without points on 11th. He was followed by Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari on 12th. Infact both the two Ferrari's finished without points as earlier Fernando Alonso's engine failed and he had to retire in the 2nd lap during the safety car period itself.

Esteban Gutierrez of Sauber and Kevin Magnussen of McLaren finished on 13th and 14th. The Lotus duo of Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado finished on 15th and 16th.

Marcus Ericsson of Caterham finished 17th ahead of Max Chilton of Marussia in 18th. Kamui Kobayashi of Caterham finished 19th and last in his home race. This may be his last race considering his performance as well as the difficult financial position of the Caterham team.

Retirements in Japanese F1 Grand Prix 2014

Jules Bianchi             Marussia
Adrian Sutil               Sauber
Fernando Alonso       Ferrari