The Spanish Grand Prix showed up the performance difference between the top three and the chasing field, as only five cars finished on the lead lap.
Lewis Hamilton had a 20-second lead by the chequered flag, a luxury which meant he didn’t have to drive flat-out in the closing stages. His quickest lap was therefore almost seven-tenths slower than the fastest lap of the race, set by Daniel Ricciardo. Hamilton had already done the leg work early in the race when he was often half a second faster than his pursuers.
According to Sebastian Vettel the reason he made a second pit stop was because his tyres weren’t going to last to the end of the race. He had made an early first pit stop which seemed to be motivated by a desire to stop Valtteri Bottas jumping ahead of him via the undercut. This meant Vettel was due for a long run to the end if he didn’t pit again.In the laps before he came in Vettel did lose a little time to Hamilton but his margin over Valtteri Bottas behind was more or less constant. Given how well he made his tyres last in Bahrain, it’s surprising Ferrari surrendered the position so readily. It may well be that they expected he would stay ahead of Max Verstappen by pitting under the Virtual Safety Car, but as he narrowly lost out there, the decision to pit backfired badly.
Significantly, there were few other takers for a two-stop strategy and Vettel’s own team mate said he was planning to pit once as well. Kimi Raikkonen, of course, was yet to pit when his car failed.
For the second race in a row Williams did the quickest pit stop. Unfortunately for them they also had the slowest car.
Explore the Spanish Grand Prix in-depth with these interactive charts:
2018 Spanish Grand Prix lap chart
The positions of each driver on every lap. Click name to highlight, right-click to reset. Toggle drivers using controls below:
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2018 Spanish Grand Prix race chart
The gaps between each driver on every lap compared to the leader’s average lap time. Very large gaps omitted. Scroll to zoom, drag to pan and right-click to reset. Toggle drivers using controls below:
Position change
| Driver | Start position | Lap one position change | Race position change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lewis Hamilton | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Valtteri Bottas | 2 | -1 | 0 |
| Sebastian Vettel | 3 | 1 | -1 |
| Kimi Raikkonen | 4 | 0 | |
| Daniel Ricciardo | 6 | 0 | 1 |
| Max Verstappen | 5 | 0 | 2 |
| Sergio Perez | 15 | 2 | 6 |
| Esteban Ocon | 13 | 3 | |
| Lance Stroll | 18 | 6 | 7 |
| Sergey Sirotkin | 19 | 2 | 5 |
| Nico Hulkenberg | 16 | ||
| Carlos Sainz Jnr | 9 | 1 | 2 |
| Pierre Gasly | 12 | ||
| Brendon Hartley | 20 | 5 | 8 |
| Romain Grosjean | 10 | ||
| Kevin Magnussen | 7 | 0 | 1 |
| Fernando Alonso | 8 | -3 | 0 |
| Stoffel Vandoorne | 11 | -3 | |
| Marcus Ericsson | 17 | 1 | 4 |
| Charles Leclerc | 14 | 5 | 4 |
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2018 Spanish Grand Prix lap times
All the lap times by the drivers (in seconds, very slow laps excluded). Scroll to zoom, drag to pan and toggle drivers using the control below:
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2018 Spanish Grand Prix fastest laps
Each driver’s fastest lap:
| Rank | Driver | Car | Fastest lap | Gap | On lap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull-TAG Heuer | 1’18.441 | 61 | |
| 2 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | 1’19.128 | 0.687 | 61 |
| 3 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 1’19.133 | 0.692 | 64 |
| 4 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull-TAG Heuer | 1’19.422 | 0.981 | 62 |
| 5 | Valtteri Bottas | Mercedes | 1’19.478 | 1.037 | 56 |
| 6 | Kevin Magnussen | Haas-Ferrari | 1’20.246 | 1.805 | 64 |
| 7 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren-Renault | 1’20.727 | 2.286 | 64 |
| 8 | Sergio Perez | Force India-Mercedes | 1’21.128 | 2.687 | 43 |
| 9 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Renault | 1’21.324 | 2.883 | 61 |
| 10 | Brendon Hartley | Toro Rosso-Honda | 1’21.439 | 2.998 | 63 |
| 11 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | 1’21.531 | 3.090 | 23 |
| 12 | Lance Stroll | Williams-Mercedes | 1’22.095 | 3.654 | 60 |
| 13 | Esteban Ocon | Force India-Mercedes | 1’22.117 | 3.676 | 36 |
| 14 | Charles Leclerc | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’22.122 | 3.681 | 51 |
| 15 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’22.487 | 4.046 | 50 |
| 16 | Stoffel Vandoorne | McLaren-Renault | 1’22.594 | 4.153 | 38 |
| 17 | Sergey Sirotkin | Williams-Mercedes | 1’22.680 | 4.239 | 57 |
| 18 | Romain Grosjean | Haas-Ferrari | |||
| 19 | Pierre Gasly | Toro Rosso-Honda | |||
| 20 | Nico Hulkenberg | Renault |
2018 Spanish Grand Prix tyre strategies
The tyre strategies for each driver:
| Stint 1 | Stint 2 | Stint 3 | Stint 4 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lewis Hamilton | Soft (25) | Medium (41) | ||
| Valtteri Bottas | Soft (19) | Medium (47) | ||
| Max Verstappen | Soft (34) | Medium (32) | ||
| Sebastian Vettel | Soft (17) | Medium (24) | Medium (25) | |
| Daniel Ricciardo | Soft (33) | Medium (33) | ||
| Kevin Magnussen | Soft (32) | Medium (33) | ||
| Carlos Sainz Jnr | Soft (25) | Medium (40) | ||
| Fernando Alonso | Super soft (21) | Medium (44) | ||
| Sergio Perez | Soft (26) | Medium (14) | Soft (24) | |
| Charles Leclerc | Soft (20) | Medium (44) | ||
| Lance Stroll | Soft (20) | Medium (44) | ||
| Brendon Hartley | Soft (1) | Medium (32) | Medium (31) | |
| Marcus Ericsson | Medium (35) | Soft (29) | ||
| Sergey Sirotkin | Soft (1) | Medium (23) | Medium (17) | Super soft (22) |
| Stoffel Vandoorne | Soft (34) | Medium (11) | ||
| Esteban Ocon | Soft (29) | Medium (9) | ||
| Kimi Raikkonen | Soft (25) | |||
| Nico Hulkenberg | Soft (0) | |||
| Pierre Gasly | Soft (0) | |||
| Romain Grosjean | Soft (0) |
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2018 Spanish Grand Prix pit stop times
How long each driver’s pit stops took:
| Driver | Team | Pit stop time | Gap | On lap | |
| 1 | Lance Stroll | Williams | 21.351 | 20 | |
| 2 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | 21.618 | 0.267 | 33 |
| 3 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren | 21.721 | 0.370 | 21 |
| 4 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull | 21.740 | 0.389 | 34 |
| 5 | Charles Leclerc | Sauber | 21.995 | 0.644 | 20 |
| 6 | Sergey Sirotkin | Williams | 22.034 | 0.683 | 24 |
| 7 | Sergey Sirotkin | Williams | 22.049 | 0.698 | 1 |
| 8 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | 22.054 | 0.703 | 17 |
| 9 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 22.085 | 0.734 | 25 |
| 10 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | 22.100 | 0.749 | 35 |
| 11 | Sergio Perez | Force India | 22.242 | 0.891 | 40 |
| 12 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Renault | 22.409 | 1.058 | 25 |
| 13 | Sergio Perez | Force India | 22.438 | 1.087 | 26 |
| 14 | Brendon Hartley | Toro Rosso | 22.472 | 1.121 | 33 |
| 15 | Brendon Hartley | Toro Rosso | 22.631 | 1.280 | 1 |
| 16 | Kevin Magnussen | Haas | 22.917 | 1.566 | 32 |
| 17 | Valtteri Bottas | Mercedes | 23.213 | 1.862 | 19 |
| 18 | Sergey Sirotkin | Williams | 23.865 | 2.514 | 41 |
| 19 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | 24.273 | 2.922 | 41 |
| 20 | Stoffel Vandoorne | McLaren | 27.416 | 6.065 | 34 |
| 21 | Esteban Ocon | Force India | 47.910 | 26.559 | 29 |
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2018 Spanish Grand Prix
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- Commanding win puts Hamilton’s bid for a fifth title on track
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juan fanger (@juan-fanger)
13th May 2018, 23:17
With the regs changing again to slow cars down, that 1’18.441 could last quite a while.
Jere (@jerejj)
14th May 2018, 3:25
@juan-fanger And the same with the pole time as well.
Sviat
14th May 2018, 7:45
McLaren are still in a galaxy far, far away in deep space.
dio
14th May 2018, 8:17
Thats what I thought when I saw the lap times…
DaveW (@dmw)
14th May 2018, 15:25
They are moving up the midfield; but it looks like the midfield is losing ground to the to top three. F1 universe continues to expand.
Tricky (@tricky)
14th May 2018, 10:20
From Lap 34 – 39 (just before the VSC) Vettel’s lap times were super consistent, but slowly increasing. On lap 39 Verstappen suddenly went ~0.6s faster than Vettel, with a sub 10s gap, and probably the belief that under the VSC they would come out in front of Verstappen, you can see why Ferrari pitted.
Martijn (@)
14th May 2018, 13:52
The tyres played a crucial role. Look at the inconsistency in lap times of RIC and Seb. It seems the tyres work a few laps then drop and come back again. Balancing the pressure on/temp of the tyres ‘too much vs too little’ every lap seem to have been the challenge. Lewis and Max seemed to do a better job at finding the sweet spot where the tyre performs in a consistent manner