Mercedes AMG Petronas took it’s third consecutive one-two finish of the season with another dominating performance at the Chinese Grand Prix.
Lewis Hamilton drove a comfortable lights to flag victory to claim his fourth win for the team with teammate Nico Rosberg holding onto his now slim Drivers Championship lead by just four points.
Hamilton achieved his 25th win in Formula One to move him into 8th on the all-time list. This puts his on the same amount of wins as Niki Lauda and Jim Clark.
“The team have done an amazing job,” said Hamilton. “All the hard work both here and at the factory is really paying off at the moment. The car is just unbelievable; in the final laps, I was pushing a little bit more to keep up the tyre temperatures and it just felt great to drive. I’m so, so happy today.”
Hamilton is still trying to make up the 25 point hit he took after retiring from the first race of the season where Rosberg won. He has won every race since.
Rosberg’s race was a lot more difficult than Hamilton’s. The German suffered a telemetry failure before the start of the race which accounted for his poor start which lead to a first corner bump with the Williams of Valtteri Bottas. Rosberg however survived the collision and was able to show some pace to come home second, ahead of Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso.
“That was not a perfect weekend for me,” a disheartened Rosberg said. “Too many things went wrong, beginning with a technical problem and a less than perfect job from me in qualifying.”
“My engineers couldn’t see what was going on in my car and therefore they couldn’t set up my clutch for the start. The clutch was completely on the wrong place, which is why I had a really bad start.”
Although Hamilton completed a hat-trick of race wins for this first time in his career he knows himself and the team can’t become complacent. “We are definitely on a roll right now; I’m working hard and we just want to improve even further when we get back to Europe.”
Rosberg, who was disappointed to once again lose out to his teammate is keeping his sights firmly on retaining his lead in the Championship and returning to the top step. “In Barcelona, the aim will be to have a normal weekend and be back in first place.”
“It was again an amazing team result and the whole team can be very proud. Congratulations to Lewis on a fantastic weekend.”
