Lewis Hamilton stormed to his fourth win in five races in Sunday’s Japanese Grand Prix ahead of Max Verstappen, while championship rival Sebastian Vettel retired with a mechanical problem.
Hamilton led from pole, while Vettel was a sitting duck on the straights in the opening laps. Falling from second to outside the top 10 with a spark plug failure, before Ferrari decided to retire the German.
Championship leader Hamilton survived a consistent challenge from Verstappen, but the Dutchman rarely posed a serious threat to Hamilton’s victory chances aside from a tense penultimate lap as they struggled to pass the lapped Fernando Alonso.
At the chequered flag, Hamilton beat Verstappen by 1.211s, the podium was completed by Daniel Ricciardo, who was passed by Esteban Ocon on the opening lap but the Australian passed Ocon on lap 10.
Ricciardo was caught by Valtteri Bottas, who started down in sixth place after a gearbox penalty, at the end of the race but the Finn failed to find a way past and had to settle for fourth position.
His fellow countryman Kimi Raikkonen rose from an early off to fifth place.
The Force India duo of Ocon and Sergio Perez were sixth and seventh, the latter unsuccessfully attempted to convince the team to swap the positions.
Haas earned its second-ever double-points finish with Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean coming home eighth and ninth.
Felipe Massa fended off a late charge from Fernando Alonso to seal the final point. Jolyon Palmer finished his final race for Renault in 12th.
Pierre Gasly was 13th and was one of very few to attempt a two-stop strategy. Stoffel Vandoorne dropped out of the top 10 on the opening lap with an off-track excursion. He ended the race in 14th ahead of Pascal Wehrlein, who made three pitstops.
Carlos Sainz Jr beached his Toro Rosso in the gravel bringing out the safety car. Just a handful of laps after the restart, Marcus Ericsson hit the barriers on the exit of Degner 2, his fifth retirement of the year.
Lance Stroll suffered a dramatic failure at Turn 2, resulting in him spearing across the gravel and nearly collecting Ricciardo. The Canadian managed to avoid him and the barriers but was forced to retire. Nico Hulkenberg completed the retirements with a rear-wing failure.
With four races to go, Hamilton has opened up a 59-point lead over Vettel with just 100 available points on offer.
