Could Nico Rosberg have made it to the end of the race without making a second pit stop?
Rosberg, who jumped ahead of his team mate during the first round of pit stops, needed to complete 61 laps on a set of Pirelli’s soft tyres to do so. That would have been the longest stint of the race by one lap – Daniel Ricciardo managed 60.
His team mate Max Verstappen also managed a 56-lap stint with little drop-off at the end and was even able to keep Kimi Raikkonen behind.
Nico Hulkenberg spent the race looking around for any tyres he could get pace out of. He ended up running a 50-lap stint on ultra-softs but sunk to the tail of the field before retiring.
Rosberg may have made an extra pit stop but at least it was a quick one. For the first time since the Australian Grand Prix, a team other than Williams managed the fastest complete time.
2016 Austrian Grand Prix tyre strategies
The tyre strategies for each driver:
Stint 1 | Stint 2 | Stint 3 | Stint 4 | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Lewis Hamilton | Ultra soft (21) | Soft (33) | Soft (17) | |
Max Verstappen | Super soft (15) | Soft (56) | ||
Kimi Raikkonen | Super soft (22) | Soft (49) | ||
Nico Rosberg | Ultra soft (10) | Soft (45) | Super soft (16) | |
Daniel Ricciardo | Super soft (14) | Soft (46) | Ultra soft (11) | |
Jenson Button | Ultra soft (9) | Soft (17) | Soft (45) | |
Romain Grosjean | Super soft (26) | Soft (45) | ||
Carlos Sainz Jnr | Super soft (9) | Soft (19) | Soft (43) | |
Valtteri Bottas | Ultra soft (9) | Soft (42) | Super soft (19) | |
Pascal Wehrlein | Ultra soft (13) | Ultra soft (10) | Soft (47) | |
Esteban Gutierrez | Super soft (21) | Super soft (20) | Soft (29) | |
Jolyon Palmer | Super soft (12) | Soft (38) | Super soft (20) | |
Felipe Nasr | Soft (43) | Super soft (27) | ||
Kevin Magnussen | Super soft (11) | Soft (38) | Super soft (21) | |
Marcus Ericsson | Super soft (12) | Soft (38) | Super soft (20) | |
Rio Haryanto | Soft (27) | Super soft (23) | Super soft (20) | |
Sergio Perez | Ultra soft (9) | Super soft (17) | Soft (43) | |
Fernando Alonso | Super soft (8) | Soft (18) | Soft (38) | |
Nico Hulkenberg | Ultra soft (8) | Super soft (16) | Soft (26) | Ultra soft (14) |
Felipe Massa | Super soft (12) | Soft (44) | Super soft (7) | |
Sebastian Vettel | Super soft (26) | |||
Daniil Kvyat | Ultra soft (1) |
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2016 Austrian Grand Prix pit stop times
How long each driver’s pit stops took:
Driver | Team | Pit stop time | Gap | On lap | |
1 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 21.035 | 55 | |
2 | Valtteri Bottas | Williams | 21.047 | 0.012 | 9 |
3 | Felipe Massa | Williams | 21.097 | 0.062 | 12 |
4 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | 21.183 | 0.148 | 14 |
5 | Felipe Massa | Williams | 21.231 | 0.196 | 56 |
6 | Sergio Perez | Force India | 21.412 | 0.377 | 26 |
7 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India | 21.580 | 0.545 | 24 |
8 | Valtteri Bottas | Williams | 21.639 | 0.604 | 51 |
9 | Jolyon Palmer | Renault | 21.745 | 0.710 | 12 |
10 | Sergio Perez | Force India | 21.883 | 0.848 | 9 |
11 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 21.890 | 0.855 | 10 |
12 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | 21.916 | 0.881 | 22 |
13 | Esteban Gutierrez | Haas | 21.921 | 0.886 | 41 |
14 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren | 21.924 | 0.889 | 8 |
15 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull | 21.945 | 0.910 | 15 |
16 | Kevin Magnussen | Renault | 22.033 | 0.998 | 11 |
17 | Jenson Button | McLaren | 22.035 | 1.000 | 26 |
18 | Esteban Gutierrez | Haas | 22.053 | 1.018 | 21 |
19 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 22.109 | 1.074 | 54 |
20 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | 22.284 | 1.249 | 60 |
21 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India | 22.601 | 1.566 | 8 |
22 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Toro Rosso | 22.605 | 1.570 | 9 |
23 | Pascal Wehrlein | Manor | 22.613 | 1.578 | 13 |
24 | Romain Grosjean | Haas | 22.662 | 1.627 | 26 |
25 | Felipe Nasr | Sauber | 22.707 | 1.672 | 43 |
26 | Jolyon Palmer | Renault | 22.728 | 1.693 | 50 |
27 | Jenson Button | McLaren | 22.859 | 1.824 | 9 |
28 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren | 22.879 | 1.844 | 26 |
29 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 22.918 | 1.883 | 21 |
30 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | 22.980 | 1.945 | 12 |
31 | Rio Haryanto | Manor | 23.326 | 2.291 | 27 |
32 | Pascal Wehrlein | Manor | 23.738 | 2.703 | 23 |
33 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | 24.326 | 3.291 | 50 |
34 | Rio Haryanto | Manor | 25.234 | 4.199 | 50 |
35 | Kevin Magnussen | Renault | 27.119 | 6.084 | 49 |
36 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India | 27.834 | 6.799 | 50 |
37 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Toro Rosso | 33.462 | 12.427 | 28 |
2016 Austrian Grand Prix
- Long stint didn’t cause Vettel’s tyre blow-out in Austria
- Point earns Wehrlein Driver of the Weekend win
- Mercedes will use team orders if Austrian GP scenario recurs
- Hamilton won’t change his approach after Mercedes discussions
- 2016 Austrian Grand Prix team radio transcript
Jelle van der Meer
3rd July 2016, 19:22
Keith an error – Riccardio didn’t do 60 laps on a set of softs. He pitted lap 14 and 60 – Verstappen pitted only on lap 15 doing 56 laps on his softs.
Jim Manna
3rd July 2016, 22:54
True. Sainz managed the longest stint on 62.
EJ
4th July 2016, 18:33
Sainz 62 laps….no way he did a 2 stopper……See above
EJ
4th July 2016, 18:34
Sorry you are right. I saw it wrong
Bradley Downton (@bradley13)
3rd July 2016, 19:53
@keithcollantine
50 laps on Ultra Softs?! No wonder he had no pace! haha
F1 in Figures (@f1infigures)
3rd July 2016, 20:57
So the pitstop trophy will be for Mercedes this time.
RicoD (@ricod)
3rd July 2016, 22:07
So where did the avantage of Ferrari and RB go to start on the supersofts? The ultrasofts were supposed to last about 4 laps…
Jonathan deitrick
4th July 2016, 3:01
The advantage went away due to the much colder weather causing much lower track temps then saturday.
hahostolze (@hahostolze)
4th July 2016, 6:45
The temperature was quite low, which helped the ultrasofts last.
F1 in Figures (@f1infigures)
4th July 2016, 10:10
And Hamilton was nursing his tires beautifully.
Mike Dee (@mike-dee)
3rd July 2016, 23:52
Rosberg might have been possible to keep going but surely Hamilton would have been able to? Don’t understand either why he stopped one lap earlier than Rosberg. Surely Rosberg leading would have had first choice to stop, and would have preferred not to be undercut by Hamilton (which didn’t work out in the end due to slow stop and mistake by Hamilton but under normal circumstances it should have worked).
andrewf1 (@andrewf1)
4th July 2016, 8:52
@mike-dee
Surely Hamilton leading in the first stint meant he had first choice to stop and all of this would have been avoided, no? Rosberg was given a 10-12 lap undercut in the first stint, whilst Lewis was given a 1-lap undercut. How was that fair?
GechiChan (@gechichan)
4th July 2016, 11:47
in the first part of the race, Hamilton (and the strategist) was watching more closely the Ferrari pair, which were running the SS tires. If he pitted too early, he would have certainly fallen behind Kimi, Vettel, Max and even Daniel. And making progress would have been probably pretty difficult, even on new tires, because those 4 were lapping close together in DRS zone.
Add the light rain that started falling and Hamilton could have lost track position with an early pit stop if this turned out into a full rain shower, because the ones who haven’t pitted yet would go directly to Inters.
So, i’m not sure this conspiracy theory that Mercedes was trying to screw lewis stands up.
Mike Dee (@mike-dee)
4th July 2016, 13:20
@andrewf1
Obviously, Hamilton had first choice in the first stop but decided not to take it as Rosberg was far behind anyway.
So my main question stands: why did Hamilton stop for a second time? He would have easily made it to the end.
andrewf1 (@andrewf1)
5th July 2016, 9:32
@mike-dee because Mercedes screwed up and called him in. You make it sound as if the driver decides his strategy, when to stop and how often.
Mike Dee (@mike-dee)
5th July 2016, 11:26
@andrewf1 Driver and his engineer decide together normally, subject to some rules with the teammate so that both don’t come in at the same time.
Sonics (@sonicslv)
4th July 2016, 12:08
Interesting Rosberg stops is 1st and 11th fastest while Hamilton is 19th and 29th. They served Hamilton 1s slower on average. Did Hamilton has problem on putting his car right in the pit?
D.K. Wilson
4th July 2016, 13:07
In fact, no Hamilton didn’t have a problem. And the entire “strategy” talk is simply bs with Toto lying and people choosing to believe the lie. Rosberg burnt his tires up in 10 laps and was rewarded for his gross error. Hamilton, on the other hand, explicitly told the team he could and would make the opening stint tires last longer than they were thought to last.
As for Hamilton’s 2nd pit stop —- why??? Has everyone already forgotten Canada? Surely Nico had to pit as he did not care for his tires well enough at all. On the other hand Hamilton put himself in position to use the exact strategy he used to win the Canadian GP. There was absolutely no reason for him to be called into the pits for a 2nd stop.