What happened yesterday:
Valtteri Bottas won.
Tenth win of his career, first of the season, he’s third in the points which is also where he was before the race but now the gap between him and Lando Norris is pretty wide.
Lewis Hamilton was frustrated with Mercedes.
Hamilton disagreed with the team’s decision to call him in for better tires late in the race, which dropped him from third to fifth. It would’ve been rather stunning for Hamilton to break through into the top two, making it a five-point swing in the standings for Hamilton and an eight-point swing from Mercedes, with the downside of staying out presumably much higher than the upside.
Charles Leclerc had a chance.
Leclerc and Ferrari made the same decision as Mercedes did for Hamilton, but in their case it yielded the lead instead of yielding a podium position. He wound up fourth.
Max Verstappen retook the championship lead.
A second-place finish put the Red Bull driver six points ahead of Hamilton. I still do not know how many races there are to go, but at this point, it seems like the answer to that is “plenty.”
Mercedes remains well clear of Red Bull.
36-point gap in the constructor standings.
***
What Hamilton should have done:
Brought a little knife with him so he could cut new grooves in the tires after they lost some traction.
The wheels turn so fast that all you’d have to do is lean out the window, put the knife on the tire for half a second, then do it again three or four times. Voila. New treads.
Made the rain go away sooner.
Sounds like this could have made the difference.
Spin out?
What’s the rule in F1 on spinning yourself out to draw a caution? Would that have worked here? Am I being the stupidest idiot that ever lived?
