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Formula 1: Lewis Hamilton overheats in Baku as Dan the man strolls to glory
So, it turns out the Baku track doesn’t just look like something from Mario Kart.
In fact, the 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix may go down in history as the first F1 meeting run to Mario Kart rules.
Lots of bumps, accidental and deliberate; plenty of things to slow you down (mostly bits of carbon fibre) scattered around the circuit; and some unlikely characters on the podium.
READ MORE: Vettel ‘disgraced himself’, roars Hamilton
It was a cracker. In Mario’s own words, Letsa Go…
Vettel: Drives like Bowser, is actually Toad
Contact happens in motorsport but it’s a given that the cars are not, under any circumstances, to be used as weapons.
If you’re off karting in the next few days and you hope to assert yourself the way Sebastian Vettel did – by using his car as a battering ram – don’t expect to be on track for very long.
Vettel got off with a ten-second stop-go penalty but, believe me, anyone on a stag weekend who tries that at a kart circuit will find themselves spectating pretty quickly.
In a race packed with incidents, Vettel did well to dominate post-race chat, thanks to that outburst of road rage when he swerved his car into Lewis Hamilton’s on Lap 20, behind the Safety Car.
Vettel (pictured) insisted he’d been ‘brake tested’ when Hamilton slowed mid-corner. On replays, it looked more like Vettel had accelerated into the Mercedes and, when the FIA looked at the telemetry from both cars, the figures showed no brake testing – Hamilton drove the corner as he had done previously under the Safety Car.
Vettel’s decision to take revenge by ramming Hamilton’s car from the side was stupid for all manner of reasons – it was dangerous, it demonstrated a mental fragility we’ve seen before from the German and, lest we forget, it cost him the race.
His ten-second stop-go penalty put him in the pits just as Hamilton surrendered the lead, to fix a loose head restraint.
Vettel also got three points on his licence, and is now just three points – or one more bit of hot-headedness – away from a one-race ban.
Here’s the thing: Vettel still finished fourth, one ahead of Hamilton, and took home 12 points, extending his lead in the championship to 14 points.
But the Ferrari star could have had 25 points – and, if he hopes to be the first non-Mercedes champion since his last title in 2013, he simply can’t afford to chuck points away.
Post-race, Vettel refused to countenance the idea he’d done anything wrong. Hamilton, meanwhile, initially responded diplomatically to questions about the incident, despite telling Race Director Charlie Whiting on his pit radio that the ten-second penalty wasn’t enough of a punishment for Vettel’s dangerous driving.
Later, though, he said: ‘He disgraced himself. If he wants to prove he’s a man, we should do it out of the car, face-to-face.
‘If we were going fast it could have been a lot worse. Imagine all the kids watching Formula 1 today and seeing that kind of behaviour from a four-time world champion. It says it all.’
It looks like the nicey-nicey battle for the 2017 championship we’ve seen thus far is well and truly over.
It’s a team sport. Sort of
While the Vettel-Hamilton bump grabbed all the headlines, it was certainly not the only one. The race was packed with bumps, a lot of them between team-mates.
At the start, Carlos Sainz spun exiting Turn One while trying to avoid Toro Rosso team-mate Daniil Kvyat.
Sainz said he’d ‘sacrificed himself’ to avoid hitting Kvyat but, diplomatically, added that he didn’t blame the Russian because he’d ‘probably have done the same thing myself’.
Kvyat was taking no responsibility for his team-mate’s misfortune, though. He said: ‘I guess there is not anything to do with me or anything. Cold tyres maybe…’
In the end, Kvyat retired and Sainz battled back to eighth, which would be a good result on any other weekend. That will have made the post-race discussions a little easier at Toro Rosso.
The same thing can’t be said for the Force India garage, where tensions have been running high despite – or perhaps because – of a run of great results.
Alas for Force India, the Baku race will be remembered as the one where Sergio Perez (pictured) and Esteban Ocon collided with each other as they got under way after a Safety Car period.
In the end, Ocon finished a handy sixth but Perez retired. Force India have been quite clear that their drivers are allowed to race each other … how often have we heard that in F1, before an embarrassing team-mate shunt forced a quiet rethink behind the scenes..?
The Mercs and the Ferraris had some close shaves without actually touching, while the Saubers also managed to come together, losing bodywork in the process, to add to the team’s other recent losses including (the somewhat more significant) Team Principal Monisha Kaltenborn.
Stroll: The kid don’t skid
Eight races into his Formula 1 career, and under intense pressure from the media and fans alike, Lance Stroll (pictured) became F1’s second-youngest podium finisher.
His third place – Bottas passed him for second on the finishing line – was the result of a fine weekend of driving, in which he kept the car out of the walls, outqualified team-mate Massa for the first time and drove a controlled race to bring home a welcome third place for Williams.
Bear in mind that, not only had Stroll never driven in Baku before arriving for the race, he hadn’t even had a chance to try the track on a simulator. And there was the small matter of him being F1’s most put-upon rookie.
It looks like Stroll’s ninth-place finish in Canada – the first points he’d scored in the sport – was a huge confidence boost for the 18-year-old, and Williams celebrated as if he’d won the championship.
It could have been even better for Williams – Felipe Massa was in third when a broken damper left his car bouncing uncontrollably and he had to pull out.
Still, not bad for a bloke who retired at the end of last season.
The winner? Oh yeah, lest we forget
It’s easy to overlook the significance of Daniel Ricciardo’s unexpected victory, simply because so much about this race was unexpected.
It was his first win of the season, following on from three impressive third places in a car that is, in theory, no match for the Ferraris and Mercedes.
And it came in a race where, back on lap six, he found himself languishing way down in 17th place, having started a modest tenth after crashing out of qualifying.
Ricciardo has earned this win – of late, he’s always been ready to take advantage of any opportunity offered up by Ferrari or Mercedes, and he’s one of the sport’s great battlers.
He hauled himself back up through the field and then, at one of the Safety Car restarts, pulled off a cracking pass on both Williams to take third – ready to assume the lead when Vettel and Hamilton had their problems.
And, of course, he treated Young Master Stroll to a sweaty bootfull of champagne (pictured) on the podium.
Anything else? How long have you got?
There were plenty of other talking points. Among those who notice such things, the chat was about how many teams were struggling with their engines this weekend.
By one estimate, around a quarter of the cars had some sort of engine issue prior to the race and Vettel went back to using an older internal combustion engine on his Ferrari.
Verstappen was scrapping with Perez for third place on Lap 12 when his engine let him down… yet again.
He has now retired from four of the last six races, while his Red Bull team-mate Ricciardo has had a run of podiums.
Is it just bad luck or does he push the car beyond its limits? It’s hard to tell, because Verstappen races as hard as anyone on the grid.
The other big mechanical talking point was centred on a lack of failure – by Fernando Alonso’s Honda engine.
Alonso piloted his McLaren home in ninth for his team’s first points of the season.
And he managed that despite losing battery power in the closing laps. Alonso had earlier sarcastically radioed his engineer to say: ‘That is a shame, we could have won this race.’
The thing is, given how much chaos unfolded in Baku, Alonso just might have had a point.
The podium consisted of Ricciardo, who’d come from 17th; Bottas, who’d come from the back of the field after a bump at the start; and Stroll, who’d been written off completely by some observers just a couple of races ago.
In 2017, Baku delivered the sort of race we anticipated last year. While the 2016 race was crippled by tyre management issues, this year’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix turned out to be F1’s crazy showcase on a crazy circuit … with some crazy driving thrown in for good measure.
If you haven’t seen it, track down a recording. You won’t be disappointed.
