top of page

Verstappen wins in Mexico, Hamilton 2017 World Champion

Writer's picture: Andrew ZarbAndrew Zarb


Max Verstappen won in Mexico in dominant fashion after taking the lead going into the first two corners, whilst Lewis Hamilton claimed his fourth World Championship, becoming one of only 5 drivers to win 4 or more World Championships (Michael Schumacher, Juan Manuel Fangio, Alain Prost and Sebastian Vettel are the other 4). Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen completed the podium, finishing second and third respectively.

At the start, polesitter Sebastian Vettel got away fairly well, however, Max Verstappen overtook him going into turns 1/2 (albeit with slight contact) for the lead with what was an extremely brave move. Lewis Hamilton managed to get up into second place, however, Vettel made contact with his rear tyre, causing a puncture to Hamilton. Vettel suffered front wing damage as well. In my opinion, Vettel was at fault for the collision with Hamilton since Hamilton was ahead of him by that time, and should have been penalised for it, however, as usual Ferrari get away with it. Vettel pitted as a result of the front wing damage, as well as Hamilton due to his puncture, which dropped them both well down the field. At this point the order was: Verstappen, Bottas, Ocon, Hulkenberg, Perez, Massa and Raikkonen.

Daniel Ricciardo retired on lap 5 with an engine issue. Nico Hulkenberg then retired as well on lap 24 with another Renault engine failure. As if it was not enough, then New Zealander Brendon Hartley retired with an engine issue on lap 30, which prompted a Virtual Safety Car (VSC) deployment. This meant that Raikkonen was able to pit and re-emerge in third. Vettel pitted onto ultra-softs and came back out in eighth place, and charged up to fourth place. Hamilton pitted onto super-softs as well, and re-emerged in 16th (all stops were during the VSC period).

Marcus Ericsson, who was doing an impressive job and was running as high as eighth till the first set of pitstops, retired on lap 55 with a rear suspension problem which led to a fire at the back of his car. Sainz was another driver to retire, stopping on lap 59 with a mechanical steering problem.

Hamilton managed to move up into 10th place but then got held up slightly behind the McLaren of Fernando Alonso, however, he eventually overtook in what was a beautiful wheel-to-wheel battle between arguably 2 of the best drivers currently on the grid to move up into 9th place which confirmed him as World Champion for 2017.

However, upfront, there was just no stopping Max Verstappen who led throughout from the moment he overtook for the lead, and won the race finishing 19.7s ahead of Bottas. Raikkonen finished 3rd ahead of Vettel, whilst Ocon equalling his best ever finish in Formula 1 in 5th place.

Hamilton is the 2017 Formula 1 World Champion, and has now surpassed Sir Jackie Stewart as the driver with the most number of World Championships by any British driver with his fourth world title. On behalf of Zarb times, congratulations Lewis!


Classification (race):

Max Verstappen - Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer

Valtteri Bottas - Mercedes

Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari

Sebastian Vettel - Ferrari

Esteban Ocon - Force India-Mercedes

Lance Stroll - Williams-Mercedes

Sergio Perez - Force India-Mercedes

Kevin Magnussen - Haas-Ferrari

Lewis Hamilton - Mercedes

Fernando Alonso - McLaren-Honda

Felipe Massa - Williams-Mercedes

Stoffel Vandoorne - McLaren-Honda

Pierre Gasly - Toro Rosso

Pascal Wehrlein - Sauber-Ferrari

Romain Grosjean - Haas-Ferrari

Not classified: Carlos Sainz, Marcus Ericsson, Brendon Hartley, Nico Hulkenberg and Daniel Ricciardo

World Championship classification:

Lewis Hamilton - 333 points

Sebastian Vettel - 277 points

Valtteri Bottas - 262 points

Daniel Ricciardo - 192 points

Kimi Raikkonen - 178 points

Max Verstappen - 148 points

Sergio Perez - 92 points

Esteban Ocon - 83 points

Carlos Sainz - 54 points

Lance Stroll - 40 points

Felipe Massa - 36 points

Nico Hulkenberg - 34 points

Romain Grosjean - 28 points

Kevin Magnussen - 19 points

Stoffel Vandoorne - 13 points

Fernando Alonso - 11 points

Jolyon Palmer - 8 points

Pascal Wehrlein - 5 points

Daniil Kvyat - 5 points

Marcus Ericsson - 0 points

Antonio Giovinazzi - 0 points

Pierre Gasly - 0 points

Brendon Hartley - 0 points

Constructors' Championship classification:

Mercedes - 595 points

Ferrari - 455 points

Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer - 340 points

Force India-Mercedes - 175 points

Williams-Mercedes - 76 points

Toro Rosso - 53 points

Renault - 48 points

Haas-Ferrari - 47 points

McLaren-Honda - 24 points

Sauber-Ferrari - 5 points


4 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All
bottom of page