This weekend was spent at the Sochi Autodrom for the Russian Grand Prix, which was held five months earlier than last season. After taking another race victory in China, Nico Rosberg was looking for his fourth win of the season, while Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari were looking for their first victory this season and hoping to limit the World Championship lead of Rosberg.
The weekend started off on a positive note for Mercedes, as they topped both of the first sessions. Nico Rosberg was at the top in free practice one, with Lewis Hamilton right behind. In the next session, Hamilton took the lead, with Sebastian Vettel separating the two Mercedes drivers. It was a positive day for Ferrari, although they knew that they would have a five-place grid penalty for the race because of their gearbox change after Vettel suffered some issues during the day. Further down the grid, Sergey Sirotkin was in the car for Renault, while Alfonso Celis was in the Force India for the first session of the weekend.
Saturday saw Mercedes top the time charts for the first half of the day, with Hamilton on top once again. Ferrari and Williams closely followed. Qualifying was not as good for Mercedes, particularly Hamilton, as he failed to take part in the Q3 due to a repeat MGU-H failure. On the other side of the Mercedes garage, it was smooth sailing for Rosberg to take the pole position. Hamilton feel to P10, while Vettel qualified P2, but feel because of the grid penalty. Kimi Räikkönen was sandwiched between the two Williams cars, who had been steadily improving all weekend.
When the race started on Sunday, Rosberg and Vettel had a great start. Unfortunately, that great start wouldn’t add up to much for Vettel, as he gets punted by Daniil Kvyat in turn two and then again in turn three, sending the Ferrari into the barrier and out of the race. The safety car was deployed, as many drivers found their cars damaged and Nico Hülkenberg retired from the race. Kvyat was handed a ten-second stop and go penalty for the collisions, while Esteban Gutiérrez was also given a drive through penalty for contact with Hülkenberg. The safety car played well into the hand of Hamilton, as he was able to overtake many cars on the restart, including the napping Kimi Räikkönen, putting himself into a podium position. It didn’t take long for him to make it to the second position, but he wasn’t able to catch his Mercedes teammate.
The cars return to Europe for a two race stint. They return to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, the home of pre-season testing, for the Spanish Grand Prix on the weekend of May 15.
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