Nico Rosberg Wastes Another Pole and Loses Japanese Grand Prix to Lewis Hamilton
Everything seemed to be falling into place for Nico Rosberg at Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix. He started on pole after Daniil Kvyat crashed with less than one minute remaining in qualifying on Saturday, wiping out Lewis Hamilton's final flying lap.
Last year, Rosberg's inability to convert his poles into victories cost him the world championship. This year, he has a different problem: He can't qualify on pole. Prior to the Suzuka race, he had started first just once, in Spain (where he did win).
After a disastrous Italian Grand Prix on September 6, where Rosberg retired and Hamilton won, the German clawed back 12 points from Hamilton's lead in Singapore last weekend, reducing the gap to 41.
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With Hamilton lining up beside him on the front row, Rosberg needed a clean, quick start to have a chance against his Mercedes team-mate. When Hamilton gets through the first corner in the lead, he is not usually caught.
Rosberg's start was good—but Hamilton's was better, and the Brit also had the inside line into Turns 1 and 2.
Rosberg was actually ahead through the first turn, but as Hamilton drew alongside and then ahead, he slowly edged Rosberg onto the kerb and then the artificial grass. It was a fair move, but only just, and as Rosberg lost speed, Sebastian Vettel and Valtteri Bottas slipped by. ESPN F1 provided a shot of Rosberg and Hamilton side-by-side in the turn:
"I didn’t really feel it was particularly that close but the inside line is the inside line, so I had my corner and so we were very, very close, but I was basically understeering, I was running out of grip," Hamilton said in the FIA post-race press conference. "I imagine Nico was running out of road, but that’s what happens when you’re on the outside."
In the televised podium interviews, Rosberg sounded almost too casual about it, saying, "Lewis just got a better start, fair play and then it was a good battle into Turn 1, but in Turn 2 he had the inside and just made it stick, so that was the end of it there."
With the red and white cars flashing past him, Rosberg may have seen his entire season flash before his eyes, knowing a fourth-place finish and a Hamilton win would leave him 54 points down with just five races remaining.
As Hamilton took off into the distance—television viewers heard the team ask him to open a 10-second gap to Vettel (it was up to 7.5 seconds before Vettel pitted on Lap 13)—Rosberg remained calm.
In Hungary, after a poor start, Hamilton made it worse by pushing too hard, too soon, trying to regain the lost places. Here, Rosberg did not make any rash moves, partly because he wasn't close enough to Bottas to try anything.
On Lap 5, Rosberg asked over the team radio if he could turn up his engine, but two laps later, the team told him it was overheating and damaging the car. So Rosberg waited while Hamilton built his lead.
After the first round of pit stops, Bottas remained on the quicker medium tyres, but Rosberg, who stopped four laps later (and got through the pit lane half-a-second quicker), switched to the hard compound. Immediately, Rosberg put pressure on the Finn and, at the end of Lap 17, he passed him with a gutsy move at the chicane. Jalopnik provided highlights of the pass:
While Rosberg has struggled wheel-to-wheel at times, particularly against Hamilton (see: Lap 1, Turn 2), this move was perfect—probably his best of the season. And he needed to have it for his championship hopes.
On Lap 29, Rosberg made his second stop, one lap before Vettel. By the time Vettel reacted, it was too late. Rosberg turned in quick laps before and after his stop, including his fastest lap of the race as Vettel was coming out of the pits.
| 28 | 1m 39.002s | 1m 39.009s |
| 29 | 1m 41.343s (enters pits) | 1m 39.094s |
| 30 | 1m 55.869s (exits pits) | 1m 40.732s (enters pits) |
| 31 | 1m 37.147s | 1m 57.856s (exits pits) |
| 32 | 1m 37.654s | 1m 37.906s |
| Total (5 laps) | 8m 31.015s | 8m 34.597s |
Those laps made the difference, but by the time Rosberg snatched second place and Hamilton emerged from his final stop, the Brit was more than nine seconds ahead, and it never got closer. Hamilton continued to pull away, ultimately winning by nearly 19 seconds.
Despite the positives from his recovery drive, Rosberg will be disappointed with another pole position wasted—another opportunity to beat his team-mate and rival head-to-head squandered.
"I had to win today," he lamented on the podium.
Indeed. There are a maximum of 125 points left in the remaining five races, and Hamilton leads Rosberg by 48. Considering the defending champ has finished lower than second only three times this year, it will be a Herculean task for Rosberg just to take the championship fight into the final race in Abu Dhabi, let alone win it.
Meanwhile, another one-two finish for Mercedes at the Russian Grand Prix in two weeks would clinch their second straight constructors' title. And while that would be a great achievement for the team, it will be little comfort for Rosberg, who came so close to the championship last year but has never been in control this season.
With Ferrari improving quickly, this should be the last year of total Mercedes dominance. Rosberg's opportunity to win a title is closing as quickly as Hamilton shut the door on him at Turn 2. If he does not want to end up another Rubens Barrichello or Mark Webber, he needs to win now—he may never again have a car this much better than the rest of the field.
As we have seen so many times, though, when he has a chance to go wheel-to-wheel with Hamilton, it is usually Hamilton who comes out ahead. In the post-race press conference, speaking about the start, Rosberg said, "I had to back out of it there, and that lost me the race eventually."
Exactly. Hamilton knows that when he leans on Rosberg, Rosberg can't or won't push back.
Could you imagine Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher, Sebastian Vettel or even Lewis Hamilton ever uttering such a sentence? I had to back out, and that lost me the race. No. And that's why they are champions.
All timing statistics are taken from the FIA's official data.
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