Start, Hockenheimring, 2018

Rate the race: 2018 German Grand Prix

2018 German Grand Prix

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What did you think of today’s race? Share your verdict on the German Grand Prix.

RaceFans has held polls on every F1 race since 2008 to find out which fans thought of each round of the season.

Join in the latest poll and give your verdict on the race: 10 being the highest and 1 the lowest. Please vote based on how entertaining and exciting you thought the race was, not on how your preferred driver or team performed.

What were the best and worst moments of the race? What was the main thing you’ll remember about it? Rate the race out of ten and leave a comment below:

Rate the 2018 German Grand Prix out of ten

  • 10 (17%)
  • 9 (33%)
  • 8 (27%)
  • 7 (13%)
  • 6 (4%)
  • 5 (1%)
  • 4 (1%)
  • 3 (1%)
  • 2 (0%)
  • 1 (2%)

Total Voters: 284

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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117 comments on “Rate the race: 2018 German Grand Prix”

  1. Mercedes team orders totally ruined the race. 1 point.

    1. Kyle (@hammerheadgb)
      22nd July 2018, 15:48

      But the Ferrari team order was totally fine?

        1. @rethla You seriously think Raikkonen thought it was fine? Again they used him entirely for Vettel’s benefit. The real problem was leaving the order so long. If they were on different strategies, why not swap them earlier? As it was Raikkonen thought he was racing Vettel until told to move aside. Mercedes’s ‘order’ was irrelevant. They actualy did race each other while Hamilton’s tires weren’t up to temperature. After that Bottas was never going to get near anyhow. Beside that fact, it’s always been a Mercedes priority to secure a 1-2 at the end of the race, which you would know if you’ve being paying attention the past few years (doubtful apparently).

          1. @david-br

            If Kimi and Vettel actually was racing each other Vettel wouldnt have let Kimi jump past him in the pits. They where on different strategies and supposed to work as a team vs the Mercedes cars and especially vs the looming Hamilton threat.
            It is fair critique why the teamorder wasnt issued earlier and why it was so unclear. It almost looked like Ferrari where ashamed of using a teamorder and expected their drivers to sort it out themself by Vettel making a proper pass and Kimi a halfharted defence.

            Mercedes was just blatantly handing Hamilton a win which is the kind of teamorder that fans despise.

            I have been paying attention in the past races but i fail to see the relevance of that here thank you very much…

          2. @rethla Well you should know then from the Rosberg-Hamilton years that Mercedes policy is to let their drivers race, with no early season driver preference, as long as it doesn’t look like they could jeopardise winning the race or either of them finishing. So – as Wolff confirmed – they actually did allow Bottas to race at the restart. He couldn’t get past. After that their concern was presumably that the two would end up tangling and gifting the race to the remaining Ferrari, not that Bottas would actually get past. It seemed clear Hamilton was vulnerable only at the restart and within the first lap had recovered the pace to keep ahead – which is what Bottas confirmed. The radio order was unnecessary and counterproductive, imo, as it just made what had already been sorted out while racing seem like a team instruction. I actually thought the opposite: it was commendable they let Bottas race at the restart, and it was quite impressive how aggressive he was this time. Good to see.

          3. @david-br If it was Hamilton attacking on Bottas and being told to stay put your explanation would make
            sense.

      1. Not really, but at least they told the slower driver to move aside… and not the other way around!

        1. This!

        2. Just for the record, the Mercedes team order came after HAM overtook BOT again and retained his lead. I believe he could have defended his position but why take the risk when it’s a 1-2?

          1. And though I think it was, in every sense, a great race for Hamilton
            Bottas and Mercedes, one can only feel a great deal of sympathy
            for Vettel and Ferrari. I much prefer ( as I suspect do most F1 enthusiasts )
            any race won fair and square, wheel to wheel, on the track,
            best driver takes the flag ! But this certainly livens up the competition
            this season, does it not ?

          2. @Loen– so Vettel making an unforced error isn’t the race being won on track?

          3. If they hadn’t had team orders they might kept battling each other, to both go off on a wet part of the track.

            Given what happened to Vettel with no preassure on him, I think Mercedes was wise to give team orders. I also think Bottas would have been kind of relieved to have that decision taken from him.

        3. ColdFly (@)
          22nd July 2018, 16:02

          I think an impartial fan will prefer a ‘hold station’ over a ‘let pass’ team order, @mg1982.

          And ‘who is faster’ can be argued either way for both teams.

        4. @mg1982

          Yeah .. sure. At least they didn’t engineer a fake overtake to get their number 1 driver past. Mercedes gave Bottas the order to hold position after he tried to pass Lewis and didn’t do it. Which is actually completely understandable given how Kimi was eyeing a pass on Bottas.

          Ferrari on the other hand, had a healthy gap to the closest Mercedes and already were in a strong position to finish 1-2. Yet, they chose to steal a potential race win from Kimi (again) by giving their whining finger boy track position. I’m glad Vettel choked and binned it.

          In the words of Alonso – “Karma”

      2. Different strategies at the time I thought??

        1. Different strategies. One was continuing to the podium and the other to the barrier.

      3. Well, Kimi definitely made that moment more entertaining for me!

        I expected the ‘hold’ to get a 1-2 after Silverstone and Austria, and with the rain – was somewhat glad they let Bottas try it first in the early few laps after the SC, again, more than I expected really.

        The rain threw things into a bit of a chaos, and Vettel again wasn’t able to do the job. Bottas drove a good race, but he lost it when he wasn’t able to stay with Vettel in the first stint, while Hamilton was able to (as we expected) get through the rear-midfield and keep his tyres going, which sort of forced Ferrari to put Kimi onto a two stop strategy to hold him off. And then the rain came, and Mercedes/HAM got the strategy/situation right, and again when Vettel missed the corner and the SC came out (maybe partly thanks to BOT once again being unlucky, this time w. his pitstop?).

      4. Kyle (@hammerheadgb)
        22nd July 2018, 16:01

        Don’t get me wrong, I’m not criticising either order as both made sense for their respective teams. But I find it bizarre how when Mercedes issue an instruction, it’s killing the sport, but when Ferrari do it, it doesn’t even get a mention.

        1. I thought it was the other way around! And I think I’m right. And it all started back in 2002 Austrian GP. The only team mentioned at a “high level” for having a no.2 was Ferrari. But it seems others practice it succesfully even without a contract.

          1. Except that in the 02 Austrian GP, Rubens was FASTER, was quite a bit ahead, and was told to slow down to a crawl (went something like 8 seconds slower in that lap) to let Michael past.

    2. +1

    3. Do you people actually watch racing? Hamilton defended superbly while his tires were coming up to temperature (check out Rosberg’s evaluation). The ‘team order’ came after he had secured the lead. Bottas had his chance. The ‘order’ was fairly irrelevant – except of course for a bunch of sour detractors.

      1. Neil (@neilosjames)
        22nd July 2018, 16:18

        +1.

        Fully agree. Bottas was never going to get a better opportunity than the one he had immediately off the restart on his fresh tyres. That was when his warmup and grip advantage was at its greatest.

    4. Ferrari tried twice to ensure Vettel’s victory: first by pitting Kimi earlier than necessary & second by telling him to let Vettel go. Vettel promptly stuffed it into the barriers. That Bottas had a go @ Lewis & Lewis successfully defended his position before the team told them to hold station (while they were expecting harder rain at any moment, mind you) and that is what ruined the race for you, seems like the only criteria for you enjoying the race is that Hamilton doesn’t win. I actually feel a tiny bit sorry for you… it must certainly suck to be that type of F1 fan in this decade. You’re pretty much guaranteed to be all in your feelings every few weeks or so!

      1. No, you’re wrong. Guys, try to be more impartial and stop pretending you know the strategies like the back of your pocket. Otherwise, you should be a strategist somewhere in a team, and not here….. Anyway, yeah, that move might look like a favour to VET if you’re blinded by the idea that RAI is there just to guard VET. But, actually, HAM was very fast on Softs, then RAI was losing time to VET and BOT, probably would have lost time to VER too if VER would have been in front… so what Ferrari did there was to keep him in front of HAM. Few more laps and he would have been behind HAM in a faster car… and only that would have been a bad strategy: to destroy his tyres (and the race) behind a slower driver. So, it was a good move, not bad. But thing is RAI is not that fast anymore (so it doesn’t matter what strategy you throw at him), plus HAM+Mercedes were the fastest combo this race, I don’t think VET would have had real chances against him if it wasn’t for the low starting position.

        1. You’re seriously implying that Ferrari don’t use RAI’s strategies purely to benefit VET’s strategies…. This happens literally every week. Ferrari have only ever cared about their #1 driver winning the race. Happened in the SCH era, the ALO era, and is happening now…. It’s nothing new. Why pretend it isn’t happening?

          1. Yeah. Don’t know on what basis do you think Ferrari uses RAI simply to support VET. RAI had the chance to support VET WDC campain by beating BOT and HAM and prevent them from taking so many points. He failed…..

            Pitting RAI in that lap served ONLY to RAI. HAM was gaining on all of them and pitting him Ferrari simply avoided to send him behind HAM and remain there. All being said and done, RAI actually started to distance himself from HAM, so he wasn’t that much of a road block either.

        2. Oh, and yeah…. it’s everyone else that needs to be impartial….lol

          1. The Ferrari brass has explicitly stated the existence of the “one rooster” policy at Ferrari, (just as Horner alluded to Vettel having the number one clause in his contract while at Red Bull) but some of these jokers pretend it doesn’t exist & only feign indignation at the thought of “team orders” when anybody else does it.

        3. Invisiblekid
          22nd July 2018, 22:31

          Erm so Ferrari pitting RAI early that just happened to leave him coming out in front of HAM was a happy coincidence?

    5. Seriously? A 1 because of something that happened right near the end. Did you only turn it on at the very end? I understand if it’s a boring race and you don’t like the result rating it low. There was a lot going on this race and I just can’t see how it was possibly a 1.

    6. Really? How in the world did you manage to be an F1 fan during the Schumacher era?

      I think you meant to post:

      Hamilton winning totally ruined the race. 1 point.

      1. Invisiblekid
        22nd July 2018, 22:31

        heh heh.

  2. A decent race overall. Not as exciting as the two previous ones, but the rain increased the excitement a bit futher.

  3. I’m not radically against team orders, but damn, these two were disappointing…

    1. Invisiblekid
      22nd July 2018, 22:36

      One stopped a team from loosing potentially 86 points in a matter of weeks.

      The other was indeed pathetic, but sadly more predictable than a dry Monaco race.

  4. Hamilton detractors: you’ve been officially shushed. Brilliant racing.

    1. Different strategies at the time I thought??

      1. Not sure who you mean by the different strategies, but the main takeaway from this race was the ability to keep the car on the track and race fast in difficult conditions, and not being able to.

    2. Nope. They just cling to the “fact” that Hamilton wouldn’t have won without team orders.

      The fact that Valterri launched a solid attack on Hamilton with much newer tires, and failed to get past, before the team orders were given, is ignored by them, much as a creationist ignores fossil evidence, or a flat earther ignores photos that show the obvious curvature of the earth.

      1. As Bottas had not overtaken Hamilton by the time he was asked to back off there is no such “evidence”. We’ll never know.

  5. Ohh Seb!! What did you do… Well done to HAM. His pace on slicks in the wet was phenomenal.

    1. I’m no See fan but that missing chunk of front wing probably had an effect.

      1. Don’t think so, it was more of an unfortunate moment, he was really slow already approaching the corner he just went to a patch of asphalt that had even less grip.

        un

        lucky for some

        1. Graham (@guitargraham)
          22nd July 2018, 16:21

          Vettel fell foul of the classic tyre temperature cliff. worn tyres lost temperature so he went slower and lost even more temperature and even more grip. eventually he was on glass and slowly found his way to the sachs curve barrier.

  6. Josh (@canadianjosh)
    22nd July 2018, 15:49

    4, coulda been a 9 or 10 but Mercedes team orders have me not even wanting to watch next weekend, such a bad thing for the fans. Ferrari and Mercedes team orders are embarrassing.

    1. I know– it’s terrible that these manufacturers that spend tens of millions of dollars annually on Formula 1 actually want to win as many points as possible for the constructor’s championship, instead of obliging a few fans who have unreasonable expectations.

      1. Canadianjosh
        22nd July 2018, 17:04

        Yawn

      2. Invisiblekid
        22nd July 2018, 22:44

        Yeah letting your drivers fight each other on a partially wet track, potentially torrential (and confirmed moments after the race finished) where one could lead the championship again, and your team regain the lead in the CWC is crazy or risk loosing another 43 points and neither of your drivers move up the DWC.

        what were they thinking?!

  7. Not boring, but very disappointing results

  8. ColdFly (@)
    22nd July 2018, 15:50

    8/10 some extremely good fights for the whole midfield.
    Team orders (Ferrari & Mercedes).
    What do people expect? The only difference is that we can now hear it.

  9. Would have been better if VET could have stayed on track with HAM closing him down.

    1. Yeah, but he made a mistake. Plus, his wing wasn’t OK. Anyway, weird race and tyres behaviour too: HAM (still) being a lot faster than anybody else on Ultras when the track was damp makes no sense at all. Expected to see him struggle the most.

      1. You must have not seen many wet races with Lewis Hamilton.

        1. I’ve watched at least 95% of the races from the last 21 years. I’m talking about his tyres, not his skills.

      2. I guess we all know how it is.. When the race is wet Hamilton tends to struggle to keep pace.

      3. HAM (still) being a lot faster than anybody else on Ultras when the track was damp makes no sense at all

        Being on the softest dry weather compounds is definitely a bigger advantage than being on the harder dry compounds. No surprises there.

        1. On a wet track?!

          1. @mg1982

            Yep. It’s the grippier of the dry compounds and easier to heat up.

      4. He had the stickiest tires, already well up to temperature when the rain started, and the track was still relatively hot, meaning a light rain would dry quickly.

        If the rain had been heavy, he’d have had to slide back into the pit sideways for wets– but since it was a light rain, he managed to be on exactly the right tires at the right moment.

        Mercedes + Hamilton has been a largely unstoppable force in the turbo/hybrid era– He’s won every rain-affected race since Hungary 2014 (and he had car issues then).

  10. Horrible, this is why people don’t watch F1, that was the most hollow win I have ever seen. Seb made a mistake but Bottas was the winner, not Lewis. Mercedes are a bunch of hypocrites, Toto is a fake like all of them. No team orders…. until we have team orders.

    Ll

    1. @garns Your comment is ridiculously sour. There was a race for position at the restart, which Bottas missed out on marginally. After that Hamilton was the faster driver, so the order was after the fact. Ferrari’s order was fine by me, even as a non-Ferrari fan, so long as they accept the impact this has on Raikkonen’s motivation. As for the race, it was full of incident.

    2. @garns

      You need some milk.

    3. @garns +1, another win for Bottas in the bin through no fault of his. Unnecessary pit stop to begin with, botched (which made no difference to be fair), then not allowed to fight for his win back. Very hollow indeed

      1. Erratum: not allowed to continue to fight for his win, given he was allowed to race at the restart. Since Hamilton was over 4 seconds ahead by the end, setting fastest lap times, it seems pure Vettel/Ferrari fan desperation to hang on to this point. Bottas had a chance at the restart, Hamilton defended, it was over. As soon as Mercedes’s radio message was broadcast, I thought it was unnecessary and would just fuel vacuous claims that Bottas was denied a race win.

        1. @david-br there was no error with what I said.

          The message was broadcast well after it was given to Bottas. Furthermore, it doesn’t change the unnecessary pit stop that cost Valtteri track position to begin with

          1. Sure it was broadcast after it was given to Bottas, but clearly not before he tried to race for position – unless he completely ignored it. As for the pit stop, he was lucky the botch didn’t really effect him in term’s of time. As for track position, Hamilton probably would have got past had Bottas still been on old tires. Obviously we won’t ever know for sure and just how long they would have let Hamilton try to get past at the restart, had their positions been reversed, is a fair point of speculation, if equally unknowable.

      2. Unnecessary pit stop..? HAM was something like 2 seconds faster than everyone else in damp conditions prior to the safety car. You really think BOT was going to be able to hold him on worn out soft tires? At that point, pitting was absolutely the right call. After the restart, BOT had a chance and wasn’t able to pass. Merc call at that point is completely understandable and it’s something Ferrari do routinely.

      3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Hungarian_Grand_Prix
        Remember that one? Where VET was having issues and RAI was clearly faster….but not allowed to pass him and told to hold off HAM?

    4. anon-e moss
      22nd July 2018, 21:38

      @garns people don’t watch F1 because it is too expensive and will be locked behind a paywall. F1 is a team sport, TEAM sport. That means their are 1000s of people involved. Someone makes the tea while others make the car. There are 2 drivers, a driver’s championship and a constructors championship. The TEAM will do what is good for the TEAM. It how they make money. I find it puzzling how people fail to grasp these facts.

  11. 9/10 Vettel blew this and it all started with Ferrari. But Seb gets no pass for crashing out in this one. Why did Mercedes bring out team orders? It must be because of tricky conditions not because the fear of racing… because they should have allowed them to race… Come on..

    1. Game was on, for the win. Bottas was on it, then they dampened that prospect. Kinda like Ferrari ruined the team duel we had spiced up for laps….

    2. Because a 1-2 is better than an Austria or Spain 2016.

  12. Really unexpected race. I don’t know how to feel because of the team orders, but definitely feeling very thrilled about this season. We just cat enough of this…

  13. Michal (@michal2009b)
    22nd July 2018, 15:52

    Race was probably quite exciting, even though very disappointing result-wise, but Mercedes team orders tainted it.

    1. Josh (@canadianjosh)
      22nd July 2018, 15:55

      1

    2. But Ferrari ordering Kimi to move out the way, as they have done numerous times was okay no doubt. Pffff

      1. Again, letting the faster car through because of the strategies vs telling the faster car who was ahead the whole race to stay behind and sacrifice a win

      2. Numerous times?! Not more numerous than Mercedes for sure…

    3. I guess you didn’t watch.

  14. Well it’s a team sport…. Gave it a 9, bravo Lewis, and kudos GRO + BH who came alive in ‘WSC conditions’.
    LH : “For those of you who don’t know me, now you do”

  15. 5.

    Bleah, another Mercedes 1-2. HAM is quite lucky indeed lately, all these SCs and chaotic races just when he started from far behind. Team orders and BOT being a perfect road block helped too. Not that Ferrari is excusable, but at least they did not ask the faster driver to remaind behind. VET messing it up too…

    1. at least they did not ask the faster driver to remain behind

      No, they asked him to pull aside. Raikkonen must have had a China 2008 déjà vu. I like the way he responded after all the Ferrari radio waffle: so, you want me to let him past? Just say so!

  16. 10, as any race when Ferrari and/or Vettel retires!

    1. ColdFly (@)
      22nd July 2018, 16:09

      There should be an age limit before letting people vote :P

      1. Yes, but then where would you find people to support Ferrari? :)

  17. Not sure if it’s 7 or 8. Could be even a 10/10, but team orders (Ferrari before and Mercedes after SC) ruined a potential fight for P1.
    Another thing. Where was that pentaly for HAM after cutting the corner/crossing the pit stop lane?

    Hopefully it wasn’t the last GermanGP.

    1. ColdFly (@)
      22nd July 2018, 16:12

      cutting the corner/crossing the pit stop lane?

      I think the pit lane starts later; the lines before are just another line (at best track limits).

    2. The penalty is a grey area– you’re right that it’s an issue before the bollard at the pit entry, but since Hamilton went across the grass between the track and the pit (not “the line” between the track and the pit), and reentered off the racing line, it’s mostly a non-issue.

      Other drivers have made the same move without penalty in the past (Baku is a little different as it has a much, much smaller pit entry).

  18. josstheboss
    22nd July 2018, 15:57

    Exciting race, with a surprising end. Too bad the rain didn’t develop into full wet. We need more wet races.

  19. Team orders are team orders, its all fine, its a team sport hence the interest of the team comes first, just as long as they are happy to admit it. Mercedes pulled off a brilliant team performance today, coupled with some excellent tyre management from Lewis and a bit of luck, they took their chances well.

    It was a good race all round. Sad how pathetic Mclaren were, absolutely shocking, worst performance ever.

  20. Pretty meh first 3/4 of the race, rain made it good, shame about the rain scenario not kicking in earlier with the race ending in full wet conditions. Annoyed about the length of the SC, too (why do lapped cars really need to overtake…?).

    8/10

    1. Lapped cars need to overtake because they will compromise the position of faster drivers who are stuck behind them because of the safety car. Getting them back on the same lap means that the leaders will have a few laps without having to overtake backmarkers.

  21. Charleclerc
    22nd July 2018, 16:04

    I’m glad Merc and Ferrari both implemented team orders. It’s part of the sport, it’s a team game. The day the drivers build and fund their own cars is the day they can risk them on a day like today. Ferrari and Merc both made the correct call at the relevant time. As for the race, it’s definitely an 8/10. Unlucky for Seb, I feel like he is developing a reputation for bottling tough situations. That Hamilton drive though was unbelievable, worthy of the race win.

  22. I find it hard to rate that because at no point during it was I actually that into it & by the time the rain came & spiced things up a bit I just didn’t care anymore.

    From cars not putting up much of a fight as Lewis was passing them, To DRS been a tad too powerful to the tyres (Different compounds & life) helping make passing a bit too easy (In the mid-field)….. These factors all just piled up (And have been for the past few years) to ensure I just never got into it & I can’t say this is something that’s ever really happened to me before.

    I’m just so down on F1 right now that I almost feel like i’m watching more out of habit than actually loving & been passionate about it as I once was. Hungary is next weekend & i’m not sure if i’ll watch it or not & I can honestly say that I have never had that thought cross my mind before.

    1. No one cares if you watch or now. My goodness. Grown men talking like kids.

    2. I think that it you’re a midfielder being overtaken by a Mercedes or a Ferrari, or maybe a Red Bull, you know there’s no point risking being punted out by someone much faster who really isn’t in the same race as you.

  23. 7, not that much racing going on, midfield had something but the embarrassing tyre choices ruined the last half.

    Kimi drove himself a contract for another year, fair enough.
    Valtteri is going to lose “the edge” for the rest of the season, he’s never been a fan of team orders, and it shows up on track. He’s there to win, period.

  24. The Skeptic (@)
    22nd July 2018, 16:14

    Great race.

    Hamilton’s drive was epic, including his defence at the restart. He put himself into the position to have some luck.

    Bottas’ drive was good. His pace wasn’t there with Hamilton when both had clear air.

    Vettel… was awesome in the dry.. then… had one of those moments!

    Raikkonen was…. surprising. So fast on his second stint. NQR on his third.

    Verstappen gambled and lost.

    Ricciardo needs to stop kicking black cats, whist smashing mirrors under ladders.

    I was on the edge of my seat to the end. Who can ask for more? I don’t care about the team orders. Both were sensible.

  25. 9/10 Amazing job by Lewis, what a race.

  26. Neil (@neilosjames)
    22nd July 2018, 16:15

    A rare 10. It was one of those races where I was fully aware of my heart rate in the closing stages, which doesn’t often happen.

    There were a few downsides – DRS a tiny bit too powerful, but that’s not a massive negative. And I wasn’t keen on the two team orders incidents, but then, I also believe neither of them impacted on the race result.

  27. Doozy. Gave it 9. Without team orders (they were at least justified) or with an actual shower during the last two laps, as it was somewhat forecasted, it would probably have been a 10.

  28. The vote may need to be reset once the post-race steward’s investigation into the pitlane line-crossing by Hamilton is done.
    I’m really frustrated that the Stewards didn’t announce the investigation into possible infringement before the race ended — they had plenty of time to do so!

  29. Miltiadis (@miltosgreekfan)
    22nd July 2018, 18:13

    8/10
    Team orders from both sides ruined it a lot, RBR wasnt in the mix but the midfield battle was again intense.
    The rain & the strategy calls-drivers mistakes made for a solid race.

  30. Above average. The second half of the race was really exciting. I gave it a well deserved 6.

  31. 3/10. Didn’t enjoy that at all and here is why: Today showed yet again that F1 is currently a two tier formula. It was far too easy for Hamilton to come from the back and pass all those cars – he didn’t had to work for it at all. His car was in another league than the cars he overtook, the DRS was too powerfull, and worse: other drivers didn’t care to defend for valid, but sad reasons.

    It’s between Ferrari and Mercedes, and both teams disappointed with team orders today. F1 has become all about playing the long game, and what is does is taking the action out of the sport. I don’t like it one bit.

    1. +1!
      Yes, I found it a frustrating race to watch too.
      And HAM was even expected to be earlier in the top 6 so wasn’t even doing miracles on his way to the front, just so much more power and DRS. VER didn’t have the power to get closer to the front and then RIC disappeared and then the race was very dull. Started to clean my espresso machine during the race …….

      When the rain came like everybody I hoped that we would have our first real wet race in 2 years, but even that failed. RBR made the wrong calls for VER and VET made that stupid little mistake and was gone. I could feel his frustration, must be awful.
      So at the end the team and the guy that always have 90% of the luck got it again. Deserved? Don’t know. He wasn’t super the whole weekend but I guess he used all his bad luck already in Q1. Didn’t even get a very deserved 5 sec penalty for that pit entry incident and the team orders kept BOT behind.

  32. Rain always spices the races up, 9/10 from me, would have been interesting if Vettel hadn’t binned it but still pretty great.

  33. I thought it was a very good race…I noticed 4% voted 1 to 3 out of 10…obviously the ones with the I love Seb tattoos….good strategy throughout…and a epic drive from lewis…shades of Mansell…and Kimi deserves another season at Ferrari…bring on nxt weekend

  34. Only gave it 7, and would’ve been 6 if it weren’t for the rain, I really like the rain, but there was too few of it, only really interesting moment was when several cars spinned and vettel went off cause they were lapping in 1.34 or so, 17 sec slower than usual times, so it was quite wet conditions, but lasted too little, else could’ve been 8. Action on track when it wasn’t wet was very few, even taking into account ricciardo’s (not even showed most of the times) and hamilton’s come back passes.

  35. Had the result ruined for me but it was still a great race to watch. Lots of fighting and what should have been an unpredictable result 8/10

  36. @keithcollantine where are the results to the 2018 races so far? can’t seem to find them.

  37. Ruined by controversies.

  38. I have missed the deadline to vote again but here is my rating and views on the race anyway as I have already typed them up.

    I gave the race an 8, a bit of rain normally adds to my enjoyment of a race and this was no exception.

    With Hamilton and Ricciardo starting out of position down the grid we knew we would be able to watch the two of them making their way through the field but as with most of the other overtakes in the first part of the race they all seemed straight forward DRS moves, if it had stayed dry I don’t think the race would have been anything special.

    Although it was mentioned that there was a chance of rain during the race throughout the weekend, we have had forecast rain never appear during races so many times over the years that I have learnt not to get my hopes up of a wet race until it is actually raining.

    From the radio clips broadcast, the teams were telling their drivers things such as rain due in ten minutes and when it came it was only on one part of the circuit, so it wasn’t clear cut what tyres would be best, a few drivers with not much to lose gambled on pitting to change to inters, most notably Verstappen, but the leaders and the majority of other drivers didn’t pit and then those that had pitted eventually had to change back to slick tyres never having benefitted from changing.

    Before the rain it looked like Vettel was on course for another comfortable victory and his first at his home circuit of Hockenheim but a small mistake in the wet cost him big, with him crashing out and retiring, if it had been a modern circuit with acres of tarmac run off Vettel probably would have been fine although he may have lost a place or two.

    As is usually the case when I only see the highlights I lost track of the pacing of the race, for example how quickly a gap builds or closes between two drivers and how long the safety car was out for, so I wasn’t clear on when exactly it was raining, how long it took to dry out and how bad the conditions were at various times.

    But if Vettel had not gone off and brought the safety car out it would have been interesting to see in the tricky conditions how far up Hamilton could have managed to get, I think it was possible that he could have gone on to win the race anyway, which really would have been something to see.

    When the safety car came out because of Vettel’s crash the leaders took the chance to pit for fresh slick tyres, the messages to Hamilton from the team were mixed and not clear and he aborted his pit entry at the last moment. They said in commentary that thought that such an action was not allowed, but as there were no messages shown on screen from the stewards during the race I thought that was that and there was no problem with it, but at the very end of the Channel 4 highlights show they said Hamilton had been called to see the stewards after the race but no further action was taken, because it didn’t seem to receive much focus on the highlights I thought it wasn’t that big of a deal.

    The race lost a mark because of the team orders from Ferrari and Mercedes, I understand why these both took place, it is not against the rules and the teams made the sensible and correct decisions, but it did detract from the race.

    It was unclear what Ferrari were doing with Raikkonen’s strategy, pitting him early got him ahead of Bottas but it also got him ahead of Vettel and the stop was much earlier than the planned one stoppers, if he was on a two stopper he surely should have been pushing flat out to build a gap, but if he was on an early one stop he should have been looking after his tyres and the team should have told Raikkonen to let Vettel past straight away.
    If he was on a different strategy to Vettel they should have told the drivers and ordered Raikkonen to let Vettel through sooner.

    Vettel was damaging his tyres following Raikkonen so closely, he never appeared to make an attempt at an actual overtake so I don’t know why he didn’t drop back a bit to look after his car, maybe he was trying his best to get past without team orders and that was as close as he could get in the dirty air.

    They broadcast a few radio communications of Vettel suggesting the team get Raikkonen to let him through but it seemed to take a while for the team to contact Raikkonen, and even then it seemed they didn’t want to straight out order him to move over and were merely suggested he should.

    I was waiting for Ferrari to tell Rakkonen “Sebastian is faster than you” as of course this was the circuit where a corresponding message was sent by Ferrari to Massa to let Alonso through and take the win in 2010 because of the situation in the championship standings.

    Hamilton and Bottas were allowed to race each other immediately after the restart and it seemed that Bottas had got his fresher tyres up to temperature quicker which put him in a position to challenge Hamilton so it was close early on, but by the time the order to hold station came it looked like Hamilton was already secure in first, and if Mercedes had let them carry on I suspect it would have been similar to Vettel and Raikkonen in that the following car not being able to get close enough to attempt an overtake and the drivers only damaging their tyres when needlessly pushing.

    Although it has nothing really to do with F1, something I found quite interesting is that it appeared Vettel’s response after crashing was to swear in English, it was censored but it did seem like it was a well-known English swear word.

    Swearing in a situation such as that is not strange but it is normally because it is an uncontrolled reaction, so I thought something like that would be in Vettel’s native German. I suppose as most regular team radio communications in F1 seem to be in English, drivers can get used to speaking in English by default in the car.

    As someone who can only speak English, even though I am old enough to know better, the immature child in me often finds it amusing when I hear that drivers for whom English is not their first language, have managed to pick up English swear words and use them on team radio.

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