Brazilian Grand Prix 2015: Winners and Losers from Interlagos Race
Nico Rosberg claimed his fifth win of the 2015 Formula One season in Sunday's Brazilian Grand Prix at Interlagos.
The Mercedes driver took his fifth pole position in a row at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace and withstood race-long pressure from his Mercedes team-mate, three-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, to secure his second win in succession and the runner-up spot in the drivers' standings.
After a poor performance at the previous round in Mexico, Sebastian Vettel was back to his best in Sao Paulo, driving maturely to break a Ferrari record, while Nico Hulkenberg also had a welcome return to form following a difficult run of results.
With a look at the contrasting tales of the two Toro Rosso rookies, Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz Jr., and Renault's ineffectual engine upgrade, here are the winners and losers from Brazil.
Winner: Nico Rosberg
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For much of their time as team-mates, and particularly since their collision at Belgium 2014, Nico Rosberg has allowed himself to be bullied by Lewis Hamilton in wheel-to-wheel combat.
Their recent first-corner incidents in Japan and the United States, for instance—where Hamilton emerged from Turn 1 in the lead despite starting second—seemed to confirm that Rosberg lacks the aggression and the raw, racing instincts of the man on the other side of the Mercedes garage.
Perhaps it is because the 2015 title race is over, or maybe he is no longer willing to concede pole position without a fight after failing to convert three consecutive poles between Suzuka and Austin, but there is now a growing feeling that Rosberg would rather send both Mercedes cars into the barriers—and to hell with the consequences—than lose the lead to Hamilton.
And that, above all else, has been at the root of his resurgence over the last two race weekends.
In the knowledge he is now competing against someone who will take enormous risks to stay ahead, Hamilton can no longer try those bold, assertive overtaking manoeuvres he has utilised throughout his career, and F1's greatest attacker has been forced to learn when to back out, to give in.
That is essentially what we witnessed at the first corner at Interlagos, where Rosberg switched across the track to cover the inside line and then outmuscled Hamilton, leaving him with no option but to tuck in behind in the hope another opportunity would later materialise.
But at a circuit where it is difficult to follow the car ahead, and with Rosberg—as the lead Mercedes driver—given the preferential strategy, that opportunity never came.
And the German, taking a stint-by-stint approach to the race, drove calmly to claim his second successive victory, securing the runner-up spot in the drivers' championship.
A pushover in the past, Rosberg is now fighting fire with fire and reaping the rewards.
Loser: Lewis Hamilton
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In the year he equalled his boyhood idol's tally of three world championships and surpassed Ayrton Senna's total of 41 race victories, taking his first victory on Brazilian soil would have been an appropriate way for Lewis Hamilton to cap his 2015 season.
Indeed, the Mercedes driver even competed with a tribute to Senna on his crash helmet, but he was unable to summon the spirit of Senna and produced one of his more unconvincing performances of the campaign at Interlagos.
Throughout his entire F1 career, Hamilton has tended to perform at his best when his personal life is stable and his preparation is trouble-free.
So when—in a post on his official Instagram account—he revealed he was suffering from a fever and was involved in a minor "road accident" in Monaco, it was impossible not to fear the worst.
Hamilton's trials and tribulations ahead of the race meant he flew to Brazil a day later than originally planned, and, in truth, he always seemed to be one step behind Rosberg all weekend.
After a bizarre third free-practice session—despite topping the time sheets, he suffered a spin and a slight technical issue—he performed admirably to qualify 0.078 seconds behind his team-mate, per the official F1 website.
The strategic nature of the race meant Hamilton, following the start, was unable to mount a sustained assault on Rosberg and his request for Mercedes to change his strategy mid-race, as heard over the FIA television feed, was rightly rejected by a team reluctant to pour any more fuel on the fire between their drivers.
That the No. 44 car produced the fastest lap of the grand prix proved Hamilton had the pace to win, but he never truly put himself in a position to do so.
Yet, as he told the post-qualifying FIA press conference, his "main job is done this year."
Winner: Sebastian Vettel
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After his off-day in Mexico, where he suffered a first-lap puncture, crashed twice at the same spot and suffered a first retirement of the season, Sebastian Vettel perhaps needed a quiet, under-the-radar race in Brazil.
And on a day when the Mercedes cars lapped 15 of the other 17 finishers, Vettel's ability to finish just 14.244 seconds behind Rosberg and 33.299 seconds ahead of Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, according to the official F1 website, only reinforced his status as the Silver Arrows' biggest threat.
The team's decision to switch the German onto the soft-compound tyres at his second pit stop, and to put Raikkonen on a two-stop strategy, proved yet again that a Ferrari team built in Vettel's image are unafraid of trying something different, pushing boundaries and being a little adventurous in their efforts to win.
While it wasn't enough on this occasion, Vettel is back to his best and with his 13th top-three result of 2015, has now recorded more podium finishes than any other Ferrari driver in their first season with the Prancing Horse, according to the team's official website—a reflection of his instant impact on F1's most sacred outfit.
This, surely, is just the start.
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Loser: Renault
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Although Renault's upgraded power unit had been available since October's United States GP, Red Bull decided not to use it in Austin and Mexico after deciding the extra power boost was not worth the accompanying 10-place grid penalty.
With nothing to lose in Brazil, however, the four-time world champions handed Daniel Ricciardo the honour of running the new-spec engine.
But by the end of the Interlagos weekend, they would have wished they hadn't bothered.
According to Motorsport.com's Jonathan Noble, the updated engine was thought to be worth 0.2 seconds per lap, but proved to be no better—and, indeed, slightly worse—than the old one.
Ricciardo could only manage ninth—two places behind team-mate Daniil Kvyat, still using the older engine—in qualifying, in which his car performed particularly poorly in the high-speed sections of Sectors 1 and 2, according to the FIA's Maximum Speeds data.
With their lead driver stuck in 19th on the grid, Red Bull employed an inventive strategy to help Ricciardo salvage something, anything from the weekend—pitting the No. 3 car after just three laps—but the Australian was only able to recover to 12th at the chequered flag.
At a time Red Bull have received much criticism for trying and failing to find a new engine supplier for 2016, Renault's calamitous upgrade has proved exactly why the team were so keen to run away.
Winner: Max Verstappen
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The first corner at Interlagos has been the scene of some of the most spectacular overtaking manoeuvres in recent years.
Michael Schumacher's forceful move on Kimi Raikkonen in 2006, Fernando Alonso's three-wide pass on Mark Webber and Felipe Massa in 2012 and Kimi returning the favour on Michael in the same race all dismissed the notion that it is almost impossible to overtake in modern F1.
The common denominator? Schumacher, Alonso and Raikkonen are all world champions, all regarded as the most talented, naturally gifted drivers of their generation.
And soon enough, Max Verstappen will join them in that exclusive club.
The boy wonder's overtaking abilities have been among the recurring themes of 2015. When the fight at the front is over and the racing in the pack is dull, there has always been Verstappen doing something exciting, challenging whatever we thought we knew about F1.
He has, in many ways, been the saviour of the season, and in a race where his fellow competitors—including a newly crowned three-time world champion—were struggling to follow and pass the car ahead, it was typical that Verstappen would make it look easy.
The 18-year-old's passes around the outside of Felipe Nasr and, in particular, Sergio Perez at Turn 1 were perfect examples of bravery, skill and judgement and will surely be among the contenders for the Overtake of the Season.
According to F1 statistician Sean Kelly, Verstappen's latest top-10 result has seen him break a Toro Rosso record for the most consecutive points finishes for a Toro Rosso driver, set by none other than four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel in 2008.
The signs are there.
Loser: Carlos Sainz Jr.
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As his Toro Rosso team-mate produced yet another outstanding performance, Carlos Sainz Jr. was again left to wonder what he would have achieved had he benefited from the same opportunities and a slice of luck.
Despite a troubled qualifying session—he told the team's official website of a "little clutch issue" and a faulty dash—Sainz was set to start 10th as a result of grid penalties elsewhere, but he was unable to make it to the grid.
The sight of F1 cars slowing to a halt on the reconnaissance lap and failing to even start races has been all too common in 2015, with Daniil Kvyat, Jenson Button, Felipe Nasr and Nico Hulkenberg prevented from starting in Australia, Bahrain, Britain and Belgium respectively.
The very fact that racing drivers, through no fault of their own, have often been unable to race only offers yet more evidence to the theory that the V6 turbo regulations have failed.
And Sainz became the latest to suffer major pre-race problems in Brazil after his engine, as he told Toro Rosso's website, "suddenly turned off."
Unable to start from his grid position, Sainz emerged from the pit lane at the beginning of the race but completed only five corners before a drivetrain problem saw him suffer his seventh retirement of the season.
Despite the excitement surrounding Verstappen and Sainz, Toro Rosso's appalling reliability record is again set to cost them in the constructors' championship, with the team seven points adrift of Lotus in the fight for sixth with just one race remaining.
Winner: Nico Hulkenberg
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Nico Hulkenberg is something of a specialist at Interlagos, having set pole position for Williams in 2010 and challenged for victory in the 2012 race.
And after encountering one of the most difficult periods of his grand prix career—the German had failed to finish five of the nine races since July's Hungarian GP, scoring only 28 points and seemingly losing his status as Force India's lead driver to Sergio Perez—a return to Brazil was exactly what he needed.
Behind the wheel of the B-spec VJM08, which seems to perform strongly at almost every circuit, Hulkenberg was a presence in the top six throughout the weekend, qualifying just 0.18 seconds behind fourth-placed Valtteri Bottas, according to the official F1 website.
Normally one of F1's finest starters, an average getaway saw him drop behind Bottas, recovering from a three-place grid penalty and Daniil Kvyat, but the team's aggressive strategy—Hulkenberg was the first of the front-runners to pit on Lap 9—allowed him to regain the positions.
In a race where most cars adopted a three-stop strategy, Hulkenberg emulated his team-mate's tyre-management tricks by spending two long stints (26 and 35 laps) on the medium tyres to finish sixth, equalling his best result of the season and securing Force India's best-ever finish in the constructors' championship.
After his deeply worrying loss of form following his previous sixth-place finish in Japan—Hulkenberg crashed out of the next two races in Russia and the United States—it would be premature to suggest he is over the worst of his mid-career crisis.
But his assured, error-free performance on a weekend when Perez—the man of the moment—was anonymous, will give Hulkenberg much confidence ahead of the final race of the season.
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