British Grand Prix 2015: Winners and Losers from Silverstone Race
In the end, there was only ever going to be one winner of the 2015 British Grand Prix on Sunday.
Over 100,000 spectators flocked to Silverstone to witness a Lewis Hamilton victory, and the reigning world champion delivered, triumphing on home soil for the second consecutive season.
It was Hamilton's fifth win of the campaign yet by far his most hard-fought. The 30-year-old has to overcome the threat of those around him to take the chequered flag.
Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas, the Williams pair, and Nico Rosberg, Hamilton's Mercedes team-mate, all threatened to steal victory from his grasp in a race of two halves, but he remained calm throughout as his rivals gradually fell out of contention.
With not one but two mid-race rain showers, a safety car intervention and even a virtual safety car period, Silverstone produced the most exciting race of 2015 thus far. Decision-making became the aim of the game, resulting in a number of inspired drivers and several disastrous performances.
Here are the winners and losers of the British GP.
Winner: Lewis Hamilton
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Twice, it looked as though Lewis Hamilton's homecoming was in danger of being ruined, yet twice he came through the other side, once again confirming his growth in maturity since his second title triumph in 2014.
The first moment of concern came at the restart at the end of Lap 3 when Hamilton, in second place, tried an ambitious move around the outside of Felipe Massa at Vale, which only resulted in his losing a position to Valtteri Bottas.
Instead of continuing his crusade and overdriving in an effort to put on a show for his cheering supporters, however, Hamilton wisely condemned himself to a first stint spent tracking the Williams cars, waiting until the first round of pit stops to pounce.
And he did so with panache, perfecting the undercut technique to jump not one but two places and establish a comfortable lead when the racing resumed.
That lead was under severe threat when his team-mate, Nico Rosberg, in free air, was catching Hamilton at a vast rate of knots, with the British driver sacrificing track position by pitting for intermediate tyres with nine laps remaining.
A common criticism of Hamilton throughout his F1 career has been his inability to read a race and make clear, confident strategy calls from the cockpit.
His decision to pit just as the rain returned with increased ferocity—"the first time in my career I perfectly made the right choice," he later told Sky Sports' Pete Gill—was particularly impressive considering it came so soon after the Monaco GP, where Hamilton and Mercedes' indecision cost them a near-certain victory.
With wet tyres bolted to his car at a time his rival was forced to tip-toe back to the pits for a stop of his own, the win—after so much uncertainty—was finally assured.
Hamilton kept his composure in one of the most emotional races of them all and reaped the rewards.
Loser: Nico Rosberg
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It felt like Nico Rosberg turned a corner when he won from second on the grid in Austria, but he disappeared back behind it at the British Grand Prix.
Hindered by technical niggles throughout practice, the German recovered well to qualify 0.113 seconds adrift of Hamilton, per the official F1 website, on Saturday. But when the five red lights went out on Sunday, Rosberg was nowhere to be seen, having been jumped off the line by the Williams cars.
While Hamilton was particularly feisty in his efforts to retaliate against Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa, Rosberg could only hang onto the leaders, remaining in fourth after his first pit stop as his team-mate regained the lead.
Rosberg, in fact, would have probably stayed in fourth for the remainder of the race had it not been for the intervention of rain, at which point he finally came alive, disposing of Bottas and Massa in quick succession.
Such was his pace in the wet conditions that he was rapidly catching Hamilton after the initial shower and even worked his way into the lead when his team-mate took to the pit lane for intermediate tyres.
But victory at Silverstone would have been even more fortunate than his win in Monaco, where he inherited first place after Hamilton and Mercedes' strategy blunder, and Rosberg, after pitting himself, ultimately lost by a comfortable margin.
The British GP very much encapsulated Rosberg, who can look like a world champion in waiting one moment and a peripheral figure the next.
And while a second-place finish is a much stronger result than it appeared he was on course to achieve at the mid-race stage, Rosberg must eradicate the two-steps-forward-one-step-back inconsistencies in his driving if he is to produce a sustained challenge in the second half of 2015.
Winner: Sebastian Vettel
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The British Grand Prix was the scene of Sebastian Vettel's least convincing performance of the season, but he still managed to claim a podium finish.
Just like his fight back through the field in Canada, the Silverstone event was yet more evidence of how formidable the four-time world champion has become behind the wheel of a scarlet-red Ferrari.
For the first time in 2015, Vettel was beaten in a straight fight in qualifying by team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, who was 0.168 seconds quicker than the German, according to the official F1 website.
But due to a "very aggressive" strategy, as he told the team's official website, was able to bounce back despite a sluggish start to the race.
Vettel was the first of the front-runners to pit, switching to hard tyres as early as Lap 14 and spending 29 laps, more than any other driver, on the orange-striped compound.
While Raikkonen entered self-destruct mode by pitting as the first spell of rain arrived at Silverstone, Vettel timed his switch to intermediate tyres to perfection, pitting at the same time as eventual race winner Lewis Hamilton on Lap 43, one lap earlier than Nico Rosberg, Felipe Massa, Valtteri Bottas and Daniil Kvyat.
The time gained in that move elevated Vettel to third, allowing him to take his sixth podium in nine races and his first top-three finish since Monaco.
Even on a weekend when Ferrari, on pure pace, were the third-best team, Vettel was still Mercedes' closest challenger.
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Loser: Williams
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Williams have won only one race in the 10 years, and it showed in the British Grand Prix, where they threw away a potential shot at victory.
Establishing a one-two position at the start of Lap 4 gave the team a chance to show how far they had come since 2014, when they missed a number of opportunities to claim their first victory since the 2012 Spanish Grand Prix, but Williams failed the winning test.
Their biggest mistake, of course, was failing to ensure Valtteri Bottas passed Felipe Massa for the lead at a stage of the race when the Finn was clearly quicker than the Brazilian—and therefore more likely to build a lead to the chasing Mercedes cars—yet the most alarming aspect of Williams' race was their management of the situation.
Bottas' overtake on Hamilton to claim second place at the end of Lap 3 was arguably the worst thing to happen to Williams, who with both drivers at the front suddenly had a decision to make.
According to the FIA television feed, both drivers were instructed to hold position on Lap 9 as the team sought to pull away in formation. Two laps later, however, Bottas was told he could overtake his team-mate, but only if he could complete a "clean move" and build a gap to those behind.
It was the kind of indecisiveness you would not expect from a team featuring the likes of Pat Symonds and Rob Smedley, who have won countless grands prix and world championships. As a result, Williams paid the price for their cautiousness, losing the lead at the first round of pit stops.
The FW37's struggles in wet conditions meant victory would have been hard to come by anyway, although it was unjust that Massa and Bottas went on to finish a distant fourth and fifth, respectively, after their solid performances in the opening stint.
Silverstone, though, only confirmed that Williams are a legendary outfit with a small-team mentality.
Winner: Daniil Kvyat
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After a difficult start to life at Red Bull Racing, Danill Kvyat has emerged as the team's star performer in recent races.
He secured his best-ever finish of fourth in May's Monaco Grand Prix, before winning the Renault-powered battle in Canada.
And after a testing weekend in Austria—which, per Autosport's Dieter Rencken and Glenn Freeman, he likened to "driving in hell"—the Russian returned to form in Britain, where he again outperformed his team-mate, three-time race winner Daniel Ricciardo, to finish sixth.
The gangling 21-year-old outpaced the Australian by 0.307 seconds in qualifying, according to the official F1 website, to start seventh. He drove a mature race, keeping his predecessor, Sebastian Vettel, honest.
Indeed, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner told Autosport's Lawrence Barretto that Kvyat might have recorded his first podium finish in F1 had he not spun while pressurising the four-time world champion, which cost him "10 to 12 seconds."
Nevertheless, the fact that Kvyat, per the official F1 website, finished just 0.761 seconds behind Valtteri Bottas, who at one stage was in contention for victory, underlined just how impressive his performance was.
Loser: Sauber
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Sauber's season slumped to a new low at Silverstone, where their pointless run of form continued.
Having been eliminated from Q1 for the third time this season on Saturday, Felipe Nasr's race was over before it started, as a gearbox problem, as confirmed by the team, left the Brazilian stranded on the Hangar Straight on his reconnaissance lap.
While the team managed to return his car to the garage with the view to starting from the pit lane, the issue meant Nasr—who has scored 16 of the team's 21 points this season—was unable to take to the track, forcing Sauber to start the race with just a single car.
Despite struggling to attract as much attention as his rookie team-mate, Marcus Ericsson had driven solidly in 2015 and was on course to record his third top-10 finish of the season at a circuit unsuited to the C34 chassis.
Yet the rain played havoc with the Swede's race as Sauber made a catalogue of errors in the changeable conditions.
Ericsson was one of four drivers to gamble and head for the pit lane at the first sight of rain, trading his hard-compound tyres for intermediates. The light rain, however, meant his tyres soon overheated on a mostly dry track, and Ericsson returned to switch back to dry-compound tyres four laps later.
A heavier shower, though, meant he was again on the wrong tyres at the wrong time, and the Swede was forced to make yet another stop—his fourth of the afternoon—after just one lap.
It was a disastrous end to the race for Ericsson, and Sauber's silliness means they have scored just two points in the last six races.
Winner: Force India
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Force India finally introduced their B-spec car at the British Grand Prix and achieved instant results, claiming their second successive double points finish.
After qualifying ninth, Nico Hulkenberg's ferocious start saw him move up to fifth on the first lap, yet his good work was undone at the first round of stops when he was jumped by the Ferraris as well as Daniil Kvyat.
The German told the team's official website of his misfortune as the conditions changed for the worse. Hulkenberg passed the pits just as the rain intensified, forcing him to complete an extra lap at reduced pace before switching to intermediate tyres, yet he still managed to bring the car home in eighth.
Despite failing to join his team-mate in Q3 on Saturday, having had his lap times deleted because of exploiting track limits, Sergio Perez mounted a typically strong recovery drive.
The Mexican may have finished closer to Hulkenberg, but being stuck behind Carlos Sainz Jr. after his first pit stop, and the team's dithering as the rain began to fall—as he told Force India's official website—forced Perez to settle for a second consecutive ninth-place finish.
Force India's strong performance at Silverstone has solidified their grip on fifth place in the constructors' standings. Force India are now 10 points clear of Lotus, who failed to make it past the first lap.
Loser: Jenson Button
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This year's British Grand Prix, much like last season's, had been billed as Jenson Button's last.
And while it is staggering to think a team as lost and desperate as McLaren-Honda would part with a driver as experienced and classy as Button at the end of 2015—especially when he is performing better than he has for a number of years—it is possible that this was his final grand prix appearance on home soil.
It was fitting, then, that Button's 16th race at Silverstone ended as disappointingly as the previous 15.
The British GP is one of just five events on the 2015 calendar in which the 35-year-old has never reached the podium; he has failed to finish higher than fourth at the Northamptonshire venue.
Although McLaren's current woes meant Button was never going to better or even match that result on Sunday, a clean run to the chequered flag would have been the least he would have wanted from the race.
Yet his afternoon was over after just three corners when the 2009 world champion was a victim of the collision between Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado, the Lotus drivers, which resulted in Fernando Alonso's car being spun into Button's.
Button told McLaren's official website how his team-mate merely "clipped my rear tyre," but it was a knockout blow for the Frome-born driver, whose engine was switched off in the collision.
The changeable, tricky conditions in the latter stages of the race made his retirement all the more frustrating given that those were the conditions in which Button has always excelled.
And while Alonso was able to take advantage of the conditions to claim his first point of the season, Button—not for the first but potentially the last time at Silverstone—was left to wonder what might have been.
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