The next part of our ‘How F1 2016 happened’ series, we take a look at the month of May.
May kicked off with a trip to the Sochi Autodrom in Russia. Nico Rosberg stormed to pole position ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Valtteri Bottas, who was an impressive third for Williams. Lewis Hamilton, who had the won the two previous races in Russia suffered a hybrid system failure in the turbocharger, the same problem that had plagued him in the last race in China.
The start of the race was chaotic as Rosberg got off the line well from pole position and maintained the lead. Vettel was hit in the rear twice by home hero Daniil Kvyat at Turn 2 and Turn 3 forcing the former to retire from the race. Further down the field, Nico Hulkenberg was hit by Esteban Gutierrez and collected by the Manor of Rio Haryanto forcing both Hulkenberg and Haryanto out of the race.
Rosberg dominated out front and ended up winning the race by over 25 seconds as teammate Hamilton recovered to second from 10th on the grid. Kimi Raikkonen was third ahead of Bottas, Felipe Massa, Fernando Alonso and Kevin Magnussen – who scored Renault’s first points of the season.
News broke between the races in Russia and Spain that Max Verstappen would be replacing Kvyat for the rest of the season after the latter’s struggling start to the season. It ultimately proved to be the correct one as the young Dutchman picked up a surprising victory at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.
The Mercedes duo collided at Turn 4 on the opening lap after Rosberg ran Hamilton out of room. This opened the race up with the battle for the win with Verstappen, Ricciardo, Raikkonen and Vettel fancying their chances. Verstappen and Raikkonen opted for a two-stop strategy with their respective teammates going for three. Raikkonen was unable to pass the Red Bull driver despite being in DRS range for much of the latter stages of the race whilst Ricciardo was stuck behind Vettel for third, despite leading the race before Red Bull’s change of strategy.
Verstappen went on to become F1’s youngest ever Grand Prix winner and the first Dutchman to do so.
The Monaco Grand Prix was the final race of May. Rosberg had taken victory at the previous two races in the principality but Red Bull were confident of taking the fight to the Silver Arrows, especially as Renault had introduced an engine upgrade for this race which would be put on Ricciardo’s car only.
This upgrade ultimately proved vital as Ricciardo stormed to his maiden pole position ahead of Rosberg and Hamilton. From the highs of Catalunya, Verstappen crashed in Q1 and would start 22nd.
Rain fell shortly before the start of the race which meant the race would start behind the safety car forcing all drivers to start on the full wet tyres. The safety car came in on lap seven and Ricciardo quickly stretched his lead over Rosberg and Hamilton. Carnage ensued further down the grid as Raikkonen damaged his front wing at the hairpin whilst Renault’s Jolyon Palmer lost control of his car on the pit straight, resulting in a brief virtual safety car period.
On lap 16, Mercedes ordered Rosberg to move over for Hamilton with the former complying with the order. The gap between race leader Ricciardo and Hamilton stood at over 13 seconds. The top two decided to stay out with the rest of the field opting for intermediate tyres.
The pivotal moment of the race came on lap 31 when Hamilton changed to slick tyres. When Ricciardo followed suit a lap later, his pit crew were not ready for him and had the wrong tyres, resulting in a long stop, handing the lead to Hamilton, who stayed narrowly ahead of him. Hamilton maintained the lead despite a lot of pressure from Ricciardo to take his second win in Monaco. Ricciardo was second ahead of Perez, Vettel and Alonso. Hulkenberg passed Rosberg to the line for sixth with Sainz, Button and Massa rounding the top 10 spots.
Going into the month of June, Hamilton reduced Rosberg’s lead to just 24 points. What would happen when F1 heads to Baku for the first time?
