The Times - UK (2022-05-23)

62 Monday May 23 2022 | the times

SportSpanish Grand Prix

Alasdair Reid

Barcelona

Those who dismiss Lewis Hamilton as

an attention-seeking clothes horse

would have to admit that the seven-

times world champion did something

pretty special at the Spanish Grand Prix

yesterday afternoon. Meanwhile, those

who have been calling him a busted

flush on social media for the past couple

of months probably spent last night

feverishly deleting their tweets.

For this was Hamilton in the true

colours of a born racer. After being

bumped by Kevin Magnussen in the

opening moments at the Circuit de

Catalunya and returning to the pits for

repairs, he rejoined the race half-a-

minute behind, in 19th place.

His situation was on the impossible

side of dire but he summoned all his

powers as a competitor and everything

he could extract from his much-

improved Mercedes and somehow

finished fifth. Had he not been ordered

to back off near the end to protect his

engine, he might have done even better.

Hamilton: Coming back

Did he enjoy the experience? “One

hundred per cent,” the 37-year-old said

with a smile. “A race like that is like a

win. It actually feels better than a win

when you’ve come from so far back and

through so much adversity.”

Hamilton surprised even himself

that he was able to recover from that

early setback. Soon after it happened he

radioed his team to suggest pulling out

but their data told them that he could

still salvage something — specifically

that he could even finish eighth — and

kept him out.

“I didn’t understand that at the begin-

ning and I thought they were being

super optimistic,” Hamilton said. “But I

said I would give it everything and see

where I came out. It turns out I was

higher than eighth! It was just a little

unfortunate at the end with the engine,

but I’m glad we finished.

“I wasn’t being defeatist. I was 30 sec-

onds behind and I thought if I was going

to use a whole engine to drive around

out of the top 15, we might as well save

it and live to fight another day. I’m glad

Alasdair Reid

G Russell (GB)

Mercedes +32.927s

M Verstappen (Neth)

Red Bull 1:37:20.475s

Constructors

4 5 6 7 8 9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

How they finished

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

10

Fastest lap S Pérez 1:24.108

C Sainz (Sp) Ferrari +45.208s

L Hamilton (GB) Mercedes +54.534s

V Bottas (Fin) Alfa Romeo +59.976s

E Ocon (Fr) Alpine +75.397s

L Norris (GB) Mercedes +83.235s

F Alonso (Sp) Alpine +1 lap

Y Tsunoda (Jap) AlphaTauri +1 lap

S Vettel (Ger) Aston Martin +1 lap

D Ricciardo (Aus) McLaren +1 lap

P Gasly (Fr) AlphaTauri +1 lap

M Schumacher (Ger) Haas +1 lap

L Stroll (Can) Aston Martin +1 lap

N Latifi (Can) Williams +2 laps

K Magnussen (Den) Haas +2 laps

A Albon (Thai) Williams +2 laps

Z Guanyu (China) Alfa Romeo DNF

C Leclerc (Mon) Ferrari DNF

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

10

Verstappen Red Bull 110

Leclerc Ferrari 104

Pérez Red Bull 85

Russell Mercedes 74

Sainz Ferrari 65

Hamilton Mercedes 46

Norris McLaren 39

Bottas Alfa Romeo 38

Ocon Alpine 30

Magnussen Haas 15

Driver Team Points

Points

Red Bull 195

Ferrari 169

Mercedes 120

McLaren 50

Alfa Romeo 39

Alpine 34

AlphaTauri 17

Haas 15

Aston Martin 6

Williams 3

S Pérez (Mex)

Red Bull +13.072s

Verstappen takes advantage

Hamilton made
a nightmare
start, being
bumped by
the Haas of
Magnussen,
inset, on the
first lap before
recovering to
In the blistering heat of the Spanish finish fifth
afternoon, this was expected to be a
slog for all concerned, a cautious
procession of drivers more concerned
with protecting their tyres than dishing
up exciting racing. But against all odds
it turned into a mesmerising spectacle,
dramatic throughout and with a plot
that had more twists and turns than the
teams will experience around the
streets of Monaco next weekend.
The only element of the Spanish
Grand Prix that lived up to pre-race
predictions was that Max Verstappen
won the thing, completing a hat-trick of
victories in the past three events. Even
then, there were grumblings about Red
Bull’s team orders, with Sergio Pérez
told to surrender his lead and allow the
reigning world champion through. “I’m
happy for the team but we need to
speak later,” the Mexican said.
“Our responsibility is to bring the
cars home with as many points as we
can,” Christian Horner, the Red Bull
team principal, said. “What Checo
[Pérez] couldn’t see at the time, which I
think he’d see perfectly well now, is that
he had such a long stint to do on a
medium tyre. Max had such a tyre
advantage. From a team perspective,
there’s just no point in taking that risk.
It was absolutely the right thing to do.”
Verstappen’s victory moved him to
the top of the drivers’ championship
standings and immediately strength-
ened his position as favourite to retain
the title he won in controversial
circumstances last year. But it was
impossible not to feel sympa-
thy for Ferrari’s Charles
Leclerc, who did nothing
wrong over the course of
a weekend in which he
qualified in pole position
and then built up what
looked like a commanding lead,
only to be forced out when his
engine gave up the ghost with less
than half the race run.
To make matters worse for the
Monaco-born driver, Leclerc had
started the day with a 19-point lead
over Verstappen at the top of the
championship. That he failed to score
a point, while the Dutchman collected
25, was a brutal outcome. “It’s a shame
and I’m disappointed that we lost the
opportunity to score a lot of points,”
Leclerc, 24, said. “But the season is long
and we know we have the potential.”
That it was not to be Ferrari’s day may
have been signalled by events on the
very first lap. While Leclerc did nothing
wrong on that opening circuit, his
Spanish team-mate, Carlos Sainz,
struggled to do anything right. First of
all, Sainz made a hash of the start and
lost a place before he reached the first
corner; then, three turns later, he made
an even bigger mess of things when he
spun off under no pressure whatsoever
— although he subsequently suggested
that his mishap had been caused by a
gust of wind.
That was not the only drama on the
first lap. As Lewis Hamilton took the
inside line at turn three, Kevin Mag-
nussen, of Haas, cut across him from
behind. The cars touched and although
the damage was slight, they both had to
pit for minor repairs. When they came
back out they were in the last two slots

and trailed the field by half a minute.

Hamilton, quite reasonably, suggested

pulling out to protect the Mercedes

engine for future races. The message

back from the team was to carry on in

the hope of salvaging a point.

But Hamilton did more than carry on

— the seven-times world champion

dug deep into his reserves of experience

and racecraft, and somehow managed

to finish fifth. In fact, it could have been

even better for Hamilton as he was

ordered to back off over the last couple

of laps due to concerns that a faulty

water pipe could cause a fatal overheat-

ing problem. Even so, his performance,

the display of George Russell, who fin-

ished third, and the competitiveness of

the Mercedes throughout the weekend

gives them good grounds to believe the

problems that beset them earlier in the

season are now a thing of the past.

Toto Wolff, the Mercedes team prin-

cipal, was characteristically bullish at

the finish — even though Russell

is now 36 points adrift of Leclerc

at the top of the standings and

Hamilton a huge 64 points

off the top. “Can we fight for

a world championship?” he

mused. “You bet we can. We

have reasons to believe we

can get there. If you look at

the standings it is very hard to

see, but F1 is a different ball game

sometimes.

“We’ve seen today that Ferrari didn’t

score a lot of points when they should

have. We will absolutely push flat out to

bring us back into the game.”

The unhappy ending to last season is

a festering wound for Mercedes and

they make little secret of their desire for

a rematch with Red Bull. There are still

16 races left of this long season but they

are up against increasingly formidable

opponents, for this was a commanding

performance by Horner’s outfit, with

Verstappen’s victory made all the more

impressive by the fact he had a half-

spin early in the race and continued to

battle the DRS issues that had ham-

pered him in qualifying.

Horner knows Mercedes are on the

march. “They’ve certainly made a step

forward,” he said. “But we still beat

them by however many seconds and

both of our cars managed to pass the

lead Mercedes. I’ve said all season it’s

only a matter of time that they join the

battle. They’ve made a big step

towards that by the looks of things.”

In racing terms, the best of it was

when Russell was scrapping with

Verstappen. Russell gave as good as he

got and defended his position with

measured aggression. Horner was

clearly impressed. “It was hard racing,”

he said. “He was getting a little bit late

with some of his moves into turn one

but the two guys were racing hard. He

showed he was getting his elbows out.”

f

e

n

tt

addddddddddddddd

e d d e e b l b t

Verstappen made it three wins in
a row with his victory yesterday

Monaco

Grand Prix

Practice, 1pm Friday

Qualifying, 3pm Saturday

Race, 2pm Sunday

TV: Sky Sports F1