Bottas cheers, Hamilton vents as controversy in Sochi keeps the title contest alive

2020 Russian Grand Prix review

Posted on

| Written by

The fight for the 2020 Formula 1 championship, which has been a one-sided affair so far, closed up at the Russian Grand Prix.

But it was hard to shake the impression it happened against the run of play, and winner Valtteri Bottas was fortunate to reduce Lewis Hamilton’s championship lead by 11 points to 44.

Pre-race error leads to penalty

As race day dawned we had the rare prospect of a genuinely close fight between the Mercedes drivers. Hamilton had taken pole position, for the fifth race in a row. But following various problems in Q2, had to start the race on the soft tyre, which was widely expected to put him at a strategic disadvantage.

Bottas lined up directly behind him on mediums. Max Verstappen, having split the two Mercedes with another of his inspired qualifying laps, was also on the more durable rubber. Hamilton would inevitably have to pit considerably earlier than both these drivers. Would he be able to recover from that deficit?

Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, Sochi Autodrom, 2020
Hamilton’s race was ruined before it started
We never got the chance to find out, as by the time he got to his mandatory pit stop Hamilton had incurred a 10-second time penalty. This was, in fact, two five-second penalties, one for each of the practice starts he performed at the far end of the pit lane exit, which the stewards deemed a violation of the rules.

Hamilton had asked Mercedes if he could practice his start further down from the usual location. They told him he could, but did not realise he meant to drive as far away as he did, as they did not see his first practice start. “When we saw the second one we thought ‘they’re not going to like that’,” said trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin.

The reason for Hamilton’s eagerness to practice his starts on a different part of the track was that he wanted to get a better feel for the grip levels at the track. At Sochi the racing line, where Hamilton lined up, offered much more grip than the opposite side of the track, as the venue is little-used between Russian Grands Prix.

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

By dint of being out-qualified by Verstappen, Bottas probably bagged himself the best starting position on the grid. When the race began he immediately drew clear of the Red Bull, and caught a perfect slipstream from his team mate through the flat-out turn one.

He was nosing ahead as they reached the first braking point but a momentary distraction when something hit his visor – a “massive bee”, he suggested – prompted him to run fractionally wide, allowing Hamilton to keep his lead.

“Anything to slow me down”

Safety Car, Sochi Autodrom, 2020
The Safety Car helped Hamilton’s cause
Within a few corners Hamilton caught a break: The Safety Car was deployed due to a pair of incidents further back. This gave him the opportunity to extend his first stint on the soft tyres, potentially reducing the advantage of those on the medium rubber.

Hamilton held his lead at the restart, and not long afterwards came the confirmation of his penalties. “Lewis we have a 10-second penalty for those start infringements,” race engineer Peter Bonnington informed him.

“What happened?” asked Hamilton, repeating the question as he waited for an answer. “Those starts going to the grid, five second penalty for each, out of position,” Bonnington replied. “That’s bullshit,” fumed Hamilton.

“Where’s that in the rule book?” he continued. “We’ll have to have that chat later, Lewis,” said Bonnington. “Anything to slow me down,” Hamilton added. “But it’s OK, I can take it.”

Hamilton didn’t need anyone to slow him down at this stage: He was already driving well within the car’s capabilities to nurse his soft tyres, backing off notably around the long turn three left-hander where the right-front takes a pounding.

But on lap 14, advised his pit stop would be soon, he increased his pace by a second. Hamilton urged the team not to bring him in early, and was fractionally quicker on his next lap. Finally the call to pit came. “Tyres are still OK,” said Hamilton. “Copy,” Bonnington replied. “Box, box.” He came in.

At Monza Hamilton had been given a 10-second stop-go penalty, which required a visit to the pits at which no work on the car can be performed. This was a different sanction: A 10-second time penalty, which had to be served at his next pit stop, though his team were still able to change his tyres.

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

“This is just ridiculous,” Hamilton fumed on his way out of the pits, adding halfway around his out-lap: “Why did you have to serve it then, why does it not just add on at the end of the race?”

“We have to serve it when we change the tyres,” Bonnington answered. “Let’s just focus.”

Bottas collects win

Bottas was able to stay out 10 laps longer on his medium tyres. He didn’t even need to cover Verstappen, who came in on lap 25 having been nine seconds behind the Mercedes. Still, Mercedes brought him in the next time around, from where he cruised home, allowing Verstappen to bring his lead down to five seconds before firing off the fastest lap of the race to grab the bonus point.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull, Sochi Autodrom, 2020
Verstappen couldn’t keep Bottas back after great qualifying lap
After two non-finishes, Verstappen was merely glad to see the chequered flag, particularly as it was the first time Red Bull had reached the podium at Sochi, a track where they haven’t excelled in the past. Hamilton never got within range and had to settle for third.

The midfield fight was less intense than usual, partly due to the first-lap crashes, but mainly because Sochi’s simple, repetitive configuration challenges neither the cars nor the drivers. Predictably, it served up the latest in a long line of dreary processions.

Lap one victims Carlos Sainz Jnr and Lance Stroll both made poor initial starts off the racing line. Stroll used the Racing Point’s straight-line speed to great effect on the run to turn two, diving down the inside of several rivals.

He went into turn four side-by-side with Charles Leclerc. The Ferrari driver claimed he understeered wide in Sergio Perez’s slipstream. Whatever the cause he knocked Stroll sideways, spinning him into a wall. The stewards were strangely uninterested in this collision, not even bothering to investigate the clearly avoidable contact which ended Stroll’s race.

Sainz was the victim of his own misjudgement and, to a lesser extent, the poor design of the turn two combination and its run-off area. He clipped a barrier while navigating the blocks, tearing the front-left wheel off his McLaren. Like Stroll, it was his second race-ending crash in as many events.

After the restart Esteban Ocon led the midfield having made the most of his starting position on the racing line. He dropped back quickly from Verstappen once the front runners upped their pace. After his pit stop he made way for team mate Daniel Ricciardo, and also lost a place to the late-stopping Leclerc, though he repelled Daniil Kvyat’s last-lap attack superbly.

Go ad-free for just £1 per month

>> Find out more and sign up

Ricciardo collected a five-second time penalty for failing to obey track limits at turn two when he passed Ocon, but was easily able to pull out enough of a lead over Leclerc to keep his eventual fifth place. He wasn’t able to catch Perez, however, who was passed by both Renaults at the start but jumped back ahead of them by pitting later than the pair, taking fourth.

Strategy compromises Gasly

Pierre Gasly paid the price of beating his team mate into Q3 and having to start on old tyres as a result. He pitted much earlier than Kvyat, who was able to jump ahead through the pits.

On lap 42 AlphaTauri tried to take advantage of a Virtual Safety Car period, pitting Gasly in the hope of getting him on fresh rubber at minimal cost. But the VSC period ended sooner than they expected, costing him positions to Lando Norris and Alexander Albon, though he was soon able to pass the pair of them on his fresher rubber on his way to ninth.

Gasly also made a bid for fastest lap at the end of the race, which nearly paid off. He ended up just two-tenths of a second slower than Bottas. “Thanks for letting me try,” he told his team on the radio.

Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari, Sochi Autodrom, 2020
Vettel laboured to a lowly 13th
Albon took the final point in 10th, the position he should have started in, before a gearbox change penalty relegated him to 15th. He still had to start on his old soft tyres from Q2, which he discarded during the initial Safety Car period, but struggled to make progress until he traded his hard tyres for medium rubber. Following the high of his Mugello podium, finishing almost a minute and a half behind his team mate was a bitter blow.

It was a tough day for Sebastian Vettel as well, who couldn’t break out of the midfield and took the chequered flag behind two Ferrari customer cars: Antonio Giovinazzi’s Alfa Romeo and Kevin Magnussen’s Haas. The latter made a terrific start, gaining nine places, six of which he kept by the time the chequered flag fell.

Norris went through the debris from his team mate’s crash at the start and had problems with his steering from then on. “I just had no feeling,” he said, “it was really inconsistent, it was making my life really difficult.” He finished 15th after taking a second pit stop, in McLaren’s first point-less finish of the year.

George Russell attempted to run a long final stint on medium tyres, but pitted two laps before the end, having already fallen to last place. He followed Romain Grosjean home, the Haas driver struggling with his car and smashing through the polystyrene blocks in the turn two run-off at one stage.

“To whom it may concern…”

Bottas was in triumphant mood after taking his overdue second win of the year. Reprising his words from last year’s Australian Grand Prix, and recalling recent criticism on social media, he declared on the radio: “To whom it may concern, fuck off.”

Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes, Sochi Autodrom, 2020
Bottas felt his win proved a point
With the best will in the world, this latest victory of his wasn’t half as impressive as his Melbourne performance a year and a half ago. On that occasion Bottas passed Hamilton off the line and beat him in a straight fight; this was a non-event by comparison.

But, given the manner in which he had to surrender a likely win to Hamilton in Sochi two years earlier, it must have been tremendously satisfying.

It also keeps him in the championship hunt. For the second time in two races he’d trimmed Hamilton’s points lead thanks to his team mate falling foul of the rule book.

Hamilton made his displeasure with the outcome clear on the radio during the race and to the media after it, claiming the stewards were “trying to stop me” by cooking up spurious grounds for penalties. This followed another investigation 24 hours earlier, when he avoided a penalty over an error at turn 12, and the saga of the FIA’s response to the T-shirt he wore on the podium at Mugello.

His remarks about the penalty – much like his usual complaints during the race about the timing of his pit stop – smacked of Hamilton blowing off steam. Still, as far as his comments on the stewards are concerned, he would be wise to avoid giving anyone cause to accuse him of bringing the sport into disrepute.

Long after the chequered flag had fallen, the stewards reversed their decision to hand Hamilton two penalty points for his error. That brought his total down from a perilously high of 10 – two shy of an automatic one-race ban – to eight. That may go some way towards persuading Hamilton that no sinister forces are trying to keep him from what still looks like an inevitable seventh title.

Author information

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...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

34 comments on “Bottas cheers, Hamilton vents as controversy in Sochi keeps the title contest alive”

  1. Incredibly salt of Lewis to make those comments. As if FIA hadn’t forgiven multiple on-track incidents. Silverstone “in-in-in-in” comes to mind. Also F1 allowing Mercedes to continue oil-burning a couple of years ago. Mercedes will still win the WCC within probably 2 or 3 races. He will win the WDC unchallenged and with at least three races to spare. So yeah… It’s ridiculous to make comments like that. It was reminiscent of the “Maybe it’s because I’m black” comment from a few years ago

    1. Lewis is lewis. He operates how he operates. Who are you to question his methods? They are, after all, very successful. Unless… is that you Michael?

      1. Oh boy

      2. Methods. How about being a bit critical? Many Hamilton fans were bashing Vettel as sore loser for races such as Canada last year, yet now such behaviour is seen as specific methods. Interesting.

        1. You genuinely see a throwaway comment in the press pen the same as physically moving the position marker board on the world feed as the same behaviour?

          If nothing else, Seb’s action outwardly disrespected the man who actually finished first more than the stewards who ‘stole’ his win with that embarassing display in parc ferme.

  2. a german fan threw black gorilla soft toy at him during a live interview after a race in 07 or 08 .
    im pretty sure that was because he was Black , i dont see any other drivers having toys thrown at them during interviews .
    People are fallible and make errors and say things spur of the moment ,doesnt make them bad people .

    1. But he isn’t Black. He is of mixed race heritage. His Mother is one hundred percent White. Hamilton is as much White as he is Black.

      1. And yet, he has still experienced racism. Funny that.

  3. I was wondering what all weekend what the VTB abbrevation stands for. Glancing at the winner’s podium, the answer seems pretty clear to me 🙈

  4. Hamilton vents?

    Hamilton is the imposter!

  5. One of the unique and frustrating things about Michael S. was that he knew the rules better than anyone, likely even the FIA. Many times it seems, he used them to his advantage. Maybe LH could benefit from knowing them too.
    I would be the first to admit that I don’t know all the rules in detail, but I did know that the area in which you can do Practice Starts, is very limited and that there is a reason for it. Otherwise there would be drivers practicing them all over the track, like they used to do.
    It’s done, finished, move on.

    1. Hamilton knew that too, which is why he asked his team for confirmation. You’d think the team would know the rules, surely they employ someone for that kind of thing?

      1. Did he?

        This is just ridiculous,” Hamilton fumed on his way out of the pits, adding halfway around his out-lap: “Why did you have to serve it then, why does it not just add on at the end of the race?”

        every f1 fan knows the time penaltys are taken when pitting or at the end of the race when there is not pitstop anymore.
        Its really ridiculous Lewis did not knew that!

        1. That’s the bit that got me as well. It would be unrealistic to expect anyone to know every bit of F1’s one thousand page rule book, but drivers should know the important bits, like how time penalties work…

          1. Why is it unrealistic? Vettel knows all basic F1 rules back to front and back again.

            Lewis prioritizes different things, learning the rules and doing trackwalks are apparently not a priority when you compete in a competition and race on a track.

        2. *Greatest of All Time*

        3. Vandoorne was commentating on the Belgian TV and was dumbfounded that he served his 10s penalty in the pits: “Are they allowed to do that?”

        4. I suspect you’d be surprised how many professional sports people don’t know all the rules for their own sport.

          1. @scbriml sure, but you would expect drivers to know basic important bits, like how penalties work. It would be like Ronaldo not knowing why he isn’t allowed to take a free kick from the other side of the pitch (though I wouldn’t put it past him (pun intended))

            @paeschli that’s poor from Vandoorne too

        5. Have you considered the fact that he was told “10 seconds” and not “2 x 5 seconds” in your thinking?

  6. …as controversy in Sochi keeps the title contest alive

    Making a lot of assumptions here.

    1. +1

      “Sochi keeps the title contest alive”. Eh?

      Er… not really… title contest already decided…

  7. What, Hamilton whine about not getting his way? Shocking. Maybe if he spent less time being a SJW and more time learning the rules and reading the steward notes, he wouldn’t have gotten penalized.

    I have no sympathy and I hate they took his penalty points away. I was rather looking forward to him making more mistakes and actually getting a race ban.

    1. So satisfying that your wishes are yours, JUST YOURS!!!

      1. @lems Oh but they’re not just mine. Only here at RF, where we are surrounded by Hammy sycophants, is mine the minority view.

        1. @jblank I look forward to your tears when he makes is 7 this year. :)

    2. Yet he is still 44 points in the lead and manages to annoy you simultaneously.

    3. His time penaltys were correct.. getting a penalty point for this is wrong.

    4. Enjoy this rare moment of Hamilton pain – they’re few and far between.

      Meanwhile, he’ll keep racking up race wins and WDCs.

  8. [Ricciardo] wasn’t able to catch Perez, however, who was passed by both Renaults at the start but jumped back ahead of them by pitting later than the pair, taking fourth.

    I thought I saw RIC and PER fight for position from T2 thru T4 in the official highlights reel.

  9. Bottas seldom beats Lewis on track and needs Lewis’s non-racing infraction to score points off him. Back to wingman status in Germany, Valtteri.

  10. For the second time in two races he’d trimmed Hamilton’s points lead thanks to his team mate falling foul of the rule book.

    What do you mean? Hamilton won at Mugello, so I don’t get this ^

  11. AJ (@asleepatthewheel)
    29th September 2020, 5:43

    @keithcollantine used to love reading the radio transcript articles when this site used to be called f1fanatic. Can we have them back please!

Comments are closed.