After Lewis Hamilton got a bit of home track advantage at the British Grand Prix and cashed in with a win, the battle of the Mercedes teammates goes to Nico’s other home track. With both drivers scoring wins at their home races (Nico in Monaco and Lewis in Britain), the pattern would hold that Rosberg would win the German Grand Prix.
However, the Formula One Power Rankings likes to buck the trend. That includes the Mercedes teammates winning pattern.
Once again, the constructors of the Formula One World Championship stayed at the track after a Grand Prix for an in-season test. For the final in-season test, Formula One stayed home for a couple of days for some running at Silverstone. It was the final time during the season that the teams would get track time outside of race weekends so who would be quickest?
As the old saying goes, sometimes, it’s better to be lucky than good. Lewis Hamilton would certainly tell you that after the season that he’s had so far. Heading to Silverstone, he’s had Mercedes’ only two DNFs along with a 2nd in Monaco because of a yellow flag caused by his teammate, Nico Rosberg.
This time, it was Rosberg who was bitten by bad luck. His first retirement of the season cleared the way for Hamilton to be the one to take advantage. With Rosberg suffering a gearbox failure, it was Hamilton who picked up the win in his home Grand Prix.
After a trip to Austria for the return of Red Bull’s home Grand Prix, is it time for someone to spoil the home festivities in Britain? The British Grand Prix is the home race for the vast majority of teams with all but three having a factory in England near Silverstone.
Will the likes of Ferrari, Sauber or Toro Rosso spoil the party? Probably not but does that mean that a British driver will join a British team on the top step of the podium? Well, there’s one man who the Power Rankings says has a good chance.
There’s one way that every race fan wants a race to be decided: On the race track. However, you could make a reasonable argument that yesterday’s Austrian Grand Prix was decided in pit lane. The cars with the best strategy and best pit stops made it to the front. He might not have had the fastest car but Nico Rosberg had the fastest race en route to his third win of the season.
After a one-race trip to the Americas for the Canadian Grand Prix, it’s a return to Europe for the return of the Austrian Grand Prix. The A1 Ring has been slightly updated since the last time that Formula One raced there. One thing that hasn’t changed is the rules governing team orders. Well, the rules changed and changed back. Not that team orders were ever an issue in Austria.
When previewing the Canadian Grand Prix, I often referred to it as one of the most exciting races on the Formula One calendar. Once again, the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve played host to a race so exciting and so dramatic that you couldn’t pull yourself away because you would certainly miss something. In fact, the action was so continuous and intense that the cameramen and FOM race feed missed a whole pile of it as it was happening because they were too interested in crowd reaction shots.
While Mercedes looked like they could be the first team to sweep a Formula One season, the racing gods decided that this wasn’t their year. Instead, ERS failures on the Mercedes cars resulted in a dramatic final stint in which the field caught but couldn’t pass Nico Rosberg. Well, the field bar Daniel Ricciardo who pulled off an epic pass with two laps to go to win his first Formula One Grand Prix.
And so the Formula One World Championship makes its annual summer pilgrimage to North America for the best event on the calendar. The Circuit Gilles Villeneuve may not be the most impressive looking track on the calendar but it does provide some of the most impressive racing on the calendar. And Montreal might not be an internationally renowned cultural mecca but that doesn’t stop the teams from claiming this race weekend has the best atmosphere this side of Monza.
So who wants to let the two Mercedes boys loose on F1’s most exciting track?
Let’s get this out of the way first: Nico Rosberg won the race for Mercedes in an absolutely dominant fashion. However, that wasn’t the real story of the race. The true hero of the Monaco Grand Prix was Jules Bianchi who kept his nose clean through the traffic, crashes and safety cars to finish 9th and score his and Marussia’s first ever points.
You know, I almost forgot the Power Rankings again. For a self-admitted massive Formula One fan, I don’t do much to prove it. Then again, if TSN didn’t leave promotion of Formula One races to in-program promos on NBC Sports Network simulcasts, maybe Canadians would remember when F1 races are!
Anyway, it’s Monaco time. Monaco is my second-favourite race of the year. Obviously, Canada is my favourite race because it’s the best race of the year. But Monaco starts off the best day in motorsports. From 8:00 AM to 11:00 PM EDT, there’s a solid wall of racing action and coverage. This is Motorsports Christmas. I love Memorial Day and I’m not even American.
The Lowdown 