This is not only the third consecutive victory at F1 2020 but also the 7th victory of Lewis Hamilton at his home track. The British driver and the reigning champion are in excellent form and seem to have not found a worthy opponent.
The two Mercedes drivers started in the top two positions, followed by Max Verstappen of Red Bull and Charles Leclerc of Ferrari. The first lap of the race was quite exciting, Leclerc overtook Verstappen at turn 2 but quickly after that, the Red Bull driver regained the 3rd position at turn 4 of lap 1.
Hamilton also faced pressure from his teammate Bottas as the driver with car number 77 continuously approached the reigning champion. However, this did not last long as Hamilton quickly created a gap with the pursuers behind and returned the race to the familiar scenario of Stages 2 and 3.
Nearing the end of the first lap, the heat of the leading group cooled down when Alexandre Albon (Red Bull) and Kevin Magnussen (Haas) collided with each other and the safety car appeared. Another accident took place on lap 13 and once again the safety car came out. This led to a change in the tire-changing strategy for the drivers, which also had an impact on the latter part of the race.
At this point, the trailing drivers pitted and changed tires one after another, forcing the two Mercedes drivers to change their strategy and pit as well. Most of the drivers switched to hard tires for the remaining part of the race. The most exciting development of Race 4 took place in the final laps.
After pushing hard to increase the gap with the following opponents, both Mercedes W11 cars showed signs of abnormal left front tires. By lap 50/52, right after passing the pit entry point, Bottas’ car had a problem with a blown left front tire. Driver number 77 tried to continue the race with a blown tire and then pitted, finishing the 3rd stage in 11th position overall.
After overtaking Bottas to secure the 2nd position and realizing the inability to compete with Hamilton while having a distance of more than 30 seconds with Charles Leclerc, Verstappen decided to pit for new tires to score an additional point for Fastest Lap.
However, this is currently one of the most controversial decisions of both Red Bull and Verstappen. With only half a lap of Race 4 remaining, Hamilton’s W11 had a left front tire blowout. At that time, Verstappen’s distance to Hamilton was 33 seconds as the Red Bull driver had just pitted before.
Both Hamilton’s and Bottas’ cars experienced front left tire blowouts.
With a blown tire, Hamilton’s speed quickly decreased while Verstappen, thanks to new tires, was able to reduce the gap between the two drivers rapidly. However, the half lap of the Silverstone track was not enough for the Red Bull driver to secure the first win of the season. Car number 44 completed the race with a torn left front tire and a gap of just over 5 seconds to the 2nd-placed driver.
In the following positions, Charles Leclerc finished in 3rd place with a gap of over 18 seconds to the 1st-placed driver. Renault’s driver, Daniel Ricciardo, secured 4th position. Thai driver Albon of Red Bull finished in 8th place while Vettel finished in 10th.
Total points standings after the first 4 races:
T?i Nguy?n (Forum.autodaily.vn)
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