Sebastian Vettel leads Ferrari to its first win in just its second race for the Scuderia in Kuala Lumpur, leaving Mercedes behind and breaking the dominance of the Silver Arrows, which Mercedes has continued to try to assert since last year.
by Bruno Fleckenstein
A turbulent year in the Formula 1 season has begun with only 15 cars contesting the Australian Grand Prix due to technical breakdowns of the cars or physical ailments of the drivers (Bottas with back problems). The paddock has been reshuffled and has already caused some discussion and confusion, with Sauber, for example, allegedly having contracted three drivers. Guido van der Garde wanted to drive at all costs, but this did not happen. A settlement was reached. The new drivers for Sauber are the Swede Marcus Ericsson, last year's Caterham driver, and the Brazilian Felipe Nasr, who acted as a test driver for Williams in 2014, and together they scored 14 points for the Sauber team, a clear improvement on the zero-point year in 2014. Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso, the two oldies and ex-champions, drive for McLaren Honda and are thus still part of the Formula 1 circus, which was not certain. Carlos Sainz and Max Verstappen are the new pilot team for Toro Rosso. They are both descended from a family of drivers. The Brazilian's father of the same name was a rally world champion and Jos Verstappen, a former Formula 1 driver, is the father of the youngest Formula 1 driver.
The race was decided during the safety car
The temperatures were quite high on this race Sunday, up to 60° Celsius track temperature was measured. And so the right tire balance was very important.
Marcus Ericsson started the race from an excellent 10th place on the grid, misjudged his position during an overtaking maneuver in the corner and drove into the gravel trap on the 4th lap, where he got stuck with his race car. As a result, the safety car was immediately brought onto the track.
This led most of the drivers to pit for a tire change. But a small group consisting of Vettel, Sainz, Grosjean, Hülkenberg and others stayed on the track and drove behind the safety car. And that led to Vettel taking the lead in the race and Hamilton, who led the race first, dropping back to 5th. This gave Vettel the opportunity to build a lead while the Mercedes were stuck in traffic and by lap 9 the gap was already 8.7 seconds from Hamilton to Vettel. On lap 17, Vettel pitted and rejoined the track in third place behind Rosberg. The Silver Arrows had regained the lead of the field in the meantime. But Vettel had the fresher tires and set the fastest lap of 1:44.5 min. on lap 20. One lap later, Vettel passed Rosberg for second place, proving that Ferrari is once again competitive with Mercedes. Fernando Alonso, meanwhile, ended his first race of the season two laps later due to technical problems. One lap later, Vettel passed Hamilton on the DRS zone and retook the lead. Hamilton then went straight in for his second pit stop.
Mercedes' pit stops and strategy suited Ferrari very well
Rosberg changed to the hard tires on lap 27 and could have gone through with it. On lap 30, the race was as follows: Vettel ahead of Hamilton (20.2), Rosberg (33.9), Raikkonen (37.1), Massa (53.2), Verstappen (56.8), Sainz (56.3), Bottas (56.9), Ricciardo (68.6) and Kwjat (72.9 sec.). On lap 37, Sebastian Vettel came in for his second pit stop and now changed to the hard, slightly slower tires, but came back on track ahead of Nico Rosberg and immediately pulled away on the fresher tires and caught up with Hamilton. Lewis Hamilton came in for a pit stop a lap later, but got hard tires instead of the faster soft tires as he had thought. He complained over the radio, saying "these are the wrong tires!" But Mercedes told him that they had not had new soft tires available and that this was the better alternative.
On lap 41, Vettel was in the lead 5.2 seconds ahead of Rosberg and 13.7 seconds ahead of Hamilton. Meanwhile, Max Verstappen drove too fast in the pit entry and slid off the track, but everything remained intact. Almost at the same time Jenson Button's McLaren was slowing down and it meant total failure for McLaren in this race.
Rosberg came in for his final stop on lap 42. Hamilton was now advised that he would catch Vettel with 5 laps to go. But Mercedes had probably miscalculated, because Sebastian Vettel kept Lewis Hamilton at bay until the end and won the Malaysian Grand Prix also due to a luckier tire strategy. But it has to be mentioned that Ferrari has become faster and more competitive and impressively proved this.
Results Malaysian Grand Prix 2015
1 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari
2 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 8.569 sec.
3 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 12.310 sec.
4 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 53.822 sec.
5 Valteri Bottas Williams 1:10.409 min.
6 Felipe Massa Williams 1:13.586 min.
7 Max Verstappen Toro Rosso 1:37.762 min.
8 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso + 1 lap
9 Daniil Kwjat Red Bull + 1 lap
10 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull + 1 lap
11 Romain Grosjean Lotus + 1 lap
12 Felipe Nasr Sauber + 1 lap
13 Sergio Perez Force India + 1 lap
14 Nico Hülkenberg Force India + 1 lap
15 Roberto Mehri Manor Marussia + 3 laps
16 Pastor Maldonado Lotus retired
17 Jenson Button McLaren retired
18 Fernando Alonso McLaren retired
19 Marcus Ericsson Sauber retired
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