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Rosberg wins in Singapore to lead championship

Lara Seychell
Formula 1

 

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By Lara Seychell

MARINA BAY CIRCUIT, SINGAPORE – The Singapore Grand Prix was filled with eventful moments till the chequered flag as Nico Rosberg and Daniel Ricciardo came close to battling it out on the final lap.

 

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The thrill of night racing, the lead changing hands, and the physical strain of the Singapore Grand Prix – here’s our look back at the weekend’s racing.

Fact of the Day

Rosberg crossed the finish line in first with Ricciardo in second and Lewis Hamilton in third. This means that now, Rosberg is leading the championship by 8 points, having won the last 3 races and the Brit obtaining mediocre results.

 

Hamilton’s recent lack of pace

So what has made Hamilton lose the lead in the championship? Well, he’s made life difficult for himself the past few races, and the team has surely not made it easy for him too. After the summer break, he has failed to deliver, starting from the penalty grid in Spa, to the bad start in Monza, to today’s lack of pace in both qualifying and the race, adding to a hydraulic problem during the free practice.

 

The two-hour long race

As predicted, the safety car came out at the Marina Bay Circuit on the first lap as Sahara Force India driver, Nico Hulkenberg, crashed into the wall after he was sandwiched by the two Toro Rosso cars.

However, the safety car didn’t last long and all cars were back to racing soon after. The 61 lap race, which is one of the most tiring of the season, with the drivers losing around 3kgs during the race, was a long and tough one.

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Different pit-stop strategy

Hamilton had to recuperate during the race, and managed to get to third place after a superb strategy from his team. He went for a 3-stop tyre change and with this he overtook Kimi Raikkonen with an undercut after the Finn went into the pits one lap later but was already too late. This strategy could have also lost Rosberg the race as Ricciardo pitted and the 28 second gap to Rosberg was reducing drastically. However, the Australian came close to Rosberg but not close enough, and crossed the line less than half a second behind the German.

 

Malaysian Grand Prix

The next race will be in two weeks’ time at the Sepang circuit, where Hamilton hopes he can put all his negative thoughts to one side and aim to achieve the top spot on the podium.