Hamilton on top

RACE ACE Lewis Hamilton took the Spanish Grand Prix crown for Mercedes on Sunday to notch his fourth victory in a row and take the Formula One championship lead from his team-mate Nico Rosberg.

In what was also the fourth successive Mercedes one-two, and fifth win in five races for the dominant constructor, Hamilton took the chequered flag a mere 0.6 of a second ahead of his German rival.

In a nail-biting finish to what had been a largely uneventful race, Rosberg piled pressure on Hamilton by slashing the Brit’s lead over the last six laps and looming ominously in his mirrors.

Hamilton, who now has 100 points to Rosberg’s 97 after his 26th career victory and leads the standings for the first time since 2012 when he was at McLaren, sounded increasingly anxious in radio traffic but held on for his first win in Spain.

“I wasn’t fast enough really today, Nico was quicker,” the 2008 champion said. “Fortunately I was able to keep him behind.”

Rosberg, who declared himself ‘a bit gutted’ to finish second again and whose subdued body language alongside Hamilton on the podium more than backed that up, felt he would have got past with one more lap.

“Lewis did a great job the whole weekend, just that little bit ahead,” added the German ruefully.

Daniel Ricciardo was third for champions Red Bull in the first podium finish of his F1 career after being stripped of his second-place for a fuel irregularity in his home season-opener in Melbourne in March.

“We did not have the pace on Mercedes... it is really nice to be on the podium and I am sure I will get to keep it this time,” said the smiling Australian, who had started third.
“A lonely third was not a bad result in the end”.

Quadruple world champion team mate Sebastian Vettel, who started 15th after a five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change, ended a weekend of setbacks with a strong fourth place.
The 26-year-old German had arrived at the first European challenge of the season with a different chassis to the previous four races, in which he had made just one podium appearance, but Red Bull remained an age away from Mercedes.

Ricciardo, as the best of the rest, crossed the line a massive 48.3 seconds behind Rosberg with Mercedes again in a class of their own and lapping all but four cars.

Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen was one of those passed by Hamilton, finishing seventh and just behind Spanish team mate Fernando Alonso - last year’s winner - in sixth.

Finland’s Valtteri Bottas took fifth place for Williams, while Brazilian team mate Felipe Massa sank from ninth at the start to 13th at the finish.

Frenchman Romain Grosjean handed Lotus their first points of the season with eighth place, ahead of Force India’s Mexican Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg in ninth and 10th respectively.

Only two drivers retired, Toro Rosso’s Jean-Eric Vergne and Caterham’s Kamui Kobayashi, in a 66 lap race that testified to the surprising reliability of the cars in the new V6 hybrid turbo era.

Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado, who crashed in qualifying and started last for Lotus, was handed a five second stop/go penalty for causing a collision with Caterham’s Marcus Ericsson.

RESULTS
1. Lewis Hamilton (Britain) Mercedes 1:41:05.155, 2. Nico Rosberg (Germany) Mercedes +00:00.636, 3. Daniel Ricciardo (Australia) RedBull - Renault 00:49.014, 4. Sebastian Vettel (Germany) RedBull - Renault 01:16.702, 5. Valtteri Bottas (Finland) Williams-Mercedes 01:19.293, 6. Fernando Alonso (Spain) Ferrari 01:27.743, 7. Kimi Raikkonen (Finland) Ferrari 1 lap, 8. Romain Grosjean (France) Lotus - Renault 1 lap, 9. Sergio Perez (Mexico) Force India - Mercedes 1 lap, 10. Nico Huelkenberg (Germany) Force India - Mercedes 1 lap, 11. Jenson Button (Britain) McLaren 1 lap, 12. Kevin Magnussen (Denmark) McLaren 1 lap, 13. Felipe Massa (Brazil) Williams-Mercedes 1 lap, 14. Daniil Kvyat (Russia) Toro Rosso - Renault 1 lap, 15. Pastor Maldonado (Venezuela) Lotus - Renault 1 lap, 16. Esteban Gutierrez (Mexico) Sauber - Ferrari 1 lap
17. Adrian Sutil (Germany) Sauber - Ferrari 1 lap, 18. Jules Bianchi (France) Marussia - Ferrari 2 laps, 19. Max Chilton (Britain) Marussia - Ferrari 2 laps, 20. Marcus Ericsson (Sweden) Caterham - Renault 2 laps.
r. Kamui Kobayashi (Japan) Caterham - Renault 32 laps
r. Jean-Eric Vergne (France) Toro Rosso - Renault 42 laps
(rank: r = retired)
Fastest Lap: Sebastian Vettel,1:28.918, lap 55.

STANDINGS
Drivers: 1. Hamilton 100, 2. Rosberg 97, 3. Alonso 49, 4. Vettel 45, 5. Ricciardo 39, 6. Huelkenberg 37, 7. Bottas 34, 8. Button 23, 9. Magnussen 20, 10. Perez 20, 11. Raikkonen 17, 12. Massa 12, 13. Grosjean 4, 14. Vergne 4, 15. Kvyat 4, 16. Sutil 0, 17. Gutierrez 0, 18. Chilton 0, 19. Kobayashi 0, 20. Maldonado 0, 21. Ericsson 0, 22. Bianchi 0.
Constructors: 1. Mercedes 197, 2. Red Bull - Renault 84, 3. Ferrari 66, 4. Force India - Mercedes 57, 5. Williams-Mercedes 46, 6. McLaren 43, 7. Toro Rosso - Renault 8, 8. Lotus - Renault 4, 9. Sauber - Ferrari 0, 10. Marussia - Ferrari 0, 11. Caterham - Renault 0.

Team by team analysis (listed in championship order)
MERCEDES (Lewis Hamilton 1, Nico Rosberg 2)
Fourth win in a row for Hamilton, who takes the overall lead from Rosberg. Fourth one-two in a row for Mercedes and fifth win in five races. Mercedes have also started every one on pole. Hamilton, who started on pole, now has 26 career wins.

RED BULL (Daniel Ricciardo 3, Sebastian Vettel 4)
Ricciardo celebrated his first F1 podium after being stripped of second place in the Australian season-opener. He started third on the grid. Vettel, using a different chassis to the previous races, started 15th after a five place penalty for a gearbox change.

FERRARI (Fernando Alonso 6, Kimi Raikkonen 7)
Alonso, last year’s winner in Spain, has now gone a year without a victory. Raikkonen was lapped.

FORCE INDIA (Sergio Perez 9, Nico Hulkenberg 10)
The team continued their record of scoring points in every race this season but lost ground to Ferrari. Hulkenberg said his race had been a case of damage limitation after struggling with tyre degradation.

WILLIAMS (Valtteri Bottas 5, Felipe Massa 13)
Williams moved up to fifth in the standings with Bottas running third at the start before falling back in the pitstops. Massa did three stops to Bottas’s two.

MCLAREN (Jenson Button 11, Kevin Magnussen 12)
McLaren have now gone three races without a point, their longest non-scoring drought in five years. Button dropped from eighth to 13th at the start. Magnussen tapped Vettel on the first lap and fell to 15th.

TORO ROSSO (Daniil Kvyat 14, Jean-Eric Vergne retired)
Kvyat suffered heavy tyre wear. Vergne was told to pit and retire on lap 25 due to an exhaust problem.

LOTUS (Romain Grosjean 8, Pastor Maldonado 15)
Grosjean bagged Lotus’s first points of the season in his 50th grand prix start and despite struggling with power unit problems. Maldonado started last after crashing in qualifying and was handed a five second stop/go penalty for causing a collision with Caterham’s Ericsson. The Venezuelan now has four penalty points for the season, more than any other driver.

SAUBER (Esteban Gutierrez 16, Adrian Sutil 17)
The Swiss team brought a new package, that took weight out of the car, but it failed to work well in all areas. They still have no points.

MARUSSIA (Jules Bianchi 18, Max Chilton 19)
Chilton stretched his record run of successive finishes to 24 races, every grand prix he has started.

CATERHAM (Marcus Ericsson 20, Kamui Kobayashi retired)
Kobayashi suffered a left front brake failure on lap 44 and retired after avoiding hitting the wall at turn one. Ericsson was hit by Maldonado at the start.