AGONY & ECSTASY AT SOCHI: Late rain dooms Norris’s victory hopes, as Hamilton’s timely switch to wet tires leads to stunning 100th victory; Verstappen also benefits to take P2 after starting last; Sainz P3 for a rare podium for Ferrari

After earning his first Formula 1 pole position and then leading for much of the race, things were looking good for McLaren’s Lando Norris to take his first career win at Sunday’s Russian Grand Prix. Holding off the hard charging Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton, who had patiently clawed his way back from a a disappointing and disjointed qualifying effort that saw him start from P4 and then an equally poor start to the race that dropped Hamilton several positions even further behind that, Norris seemed to have enough in his car and tires as the laps wound down to keep the seven-time champion behind and secure a breakout victory, albeit one that should surely have been very close at the line. However, the weather gods of the Black Sea had other ideas and on Lap 46 of the 53-lap contest the rains that had dogged qualifying on Saturday returned to play their part in this dramatic race from the Sochi Autodrom. At first relatively light, the intensity of the downpour increased over the waning laps to such a degree that slick tires began to seem more like ice skates. With Norris and Hamilton far in front of the field and essentially running their own race, one by one the cars behind them began to pit for Intermediate wet weather Pirellis to deal with the rapidly deteriorating conditions on the greasy circuit. It was crunch time for the respective brain trusts at McLaren and Mercedes to consult the radar and make their own decisions about whether to pop into the pits for rain tires.

Crucially, McLaren’s pit wall let them be talked into staying out by a recalcitrant Norris, who understandably did not want to give up his lead and potentially the win by pitting so late in the race when the rain might just as well cease as quickly as it started. It turned out to be a major miscalculation, however, because the rain kept intensifying and then Hamilton, who was, in fact, equally reluctant to make the extra stop, was ordered by Mercedes to come in for Inters and complied on Lap 49. Norris stayed out hoping he could manage the final four laps on his older Hard slick tires but it was clearly the wrong call, as his McLaren kept stepping out with increasing frequency. By Lap 51, Hamilton had caught the struggling Norris and passed him for the lead easily when Norris slid into a runoff area at Turn 5, the wettest part of the track. Norris conceded the impossibility of his circumstance and tiptoed into the pits for the necessary Inters but by now it was too late. Hamilton had secured a lead he would never relinquish after a lot of hard work and the right call by the team and Norris saw a large portion of the frontrunners pass him while he was in the pits, so slow and tentative was his in lap. While Hamilton took the checkers to finally earn his mind-blowing one-hundredth career F1 victory, the crestfallen Norris came home a supremely disappointing P7 on a day when it looked like he would be the one dancing on the top step of the victors’ podium. The young Englishman could only curse the Russian rains and console himself with the fact that he is one of the up and coming drivers in the sport and his day will certainly be coming in the future.

Perhaps the only driver happier than Hamilton was Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, his only championship rival. After starting from dead last on the grid in P20 after the team decided to take a fresh engine for this race, Verstappen gave his usual brilliant effort and made a ton of passes early in the race to pull himself back into the points paying positions. Prior to the rain, however, he had stalled out around P6. But the Dutchman was an early taker for the Intermediate tires when the showers began falling, coming in a lap earlier than Hamilton on Lap 48, and in the ensuing scramble of some cars on slick and some on Inters, managed to whip by a ton of other competitors in short order. By the time the laps ran out Verstappen had somehow managed to finish second overall, a massive amount fo damage control on a day where he was not even realistically thinking of a podium. While Verstappen did concede the lead to Hamilton in the Drivers’ standings, it was only by a razor thin two points and not the potential double digit swing it could have been. In that way it was a very fortuitous and successful day for Verstappen and Red Bull. They also know that Hamilton, too, will likely have to change his engine and incur the penalties that go with it sometime fairly soon, while ideally Max’s power unit should be good to go for the rest of the season. It certainly seems like this 2021 heavyweight title bout is going to go down to the wire and could be decided at the last race of the year in the second week of December in Abu Dhabi.

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, who started alongside Norris in P2, who got by the McLaren for the lead early but then seemed to fade after a poorly timed early pit stop, also got the benefit of the Scuderia’s wise decision to throw a set of Inters on his Prancing Horse on Lap 48. That enabled the Spaniard to fight his way forward all the way up to P3 and the last spot on the podium. Perplexingly, however, the team split their strategy and kept the unlucky Charles Leclerc out on slicks until the final lap of the race. Leclerc, who was positively sliding for the last few laps, tumbled out of the points and down to P15 on a day where he drove much better than that and deserved better. The second McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo, the prior race winner at Monza, actually bettered his teammate Norris with a solid P4 finish despite clearly being not as fast all day. Again, the switch to wet tires proved the deciding factor for the affable Aussie, as the failure to do so proved to be the heartbroken Norris’s undoing.

Top 10 finishers of the Russian GP:

Complete race results available via Formula1.com.

The next race is in a fortnight’s time — the Turkish Grand Prix. With the battle between Hamilton and Verstappen see-sawing away and tight as a tick look for more on track excitement as the races dwindle to a handful. Hope to see you then to find out how it all shakes out!