Hamilton extends F1 championship lead with German GP victory

Indeed having been 43 points behind Rosberg in May, Hamilton is now comfortably ahead of his Mercedes team-mate by virtue of an unbeaten July with victories in Austria, Silverstone, Hungary and here in Germany on Sunday.

Daniel Ricciardo was second, ahead of Red Bull teammate Max Verstappen, the first time these two Red Bull drivers shared the podium.

Dutch teenager Max Verstappen claimed he would have crashed into Nico Rosberg if he had not driven off the track to avoid him on his way to finishing third in Sunday’s German Grand Prix. In the time since, however, he’s won just once while Hamilton has taken victory in all but one of the remaining races, and after his one-point lead finally disappeared last weekend, another bad week sees the German driver suddenly in Hamilton’s former position with more than a third of the season left.

Rosberg finished fourth after being given a five-second penalty for forcing Verstappen off the track when he passed him at the hairpin.

“This is two weekends in a row now with a podium”, said Australian Ricciardo.

“Not only was it just one lap that I had but I also had extra fuel to make sure that I would have an extra shot if a mistake or something happens”, said Rosberg after the session.

“We had various problems but I have to say the Red Bull’s were very quicker here than I thought altogether, which is a good result for them”.

“Hopefully I’ve saved enough of my engine today hoping that I would be able to use it at the next race”, he explained.

Further back, Sebastian Vettel led home the Ferraris in fifth and sixth, 4.5 seconds up on team-mate, Kimi Raikkonen.

“This is the first double podium for [Red Bull] in over a year and it is awesome to close out the first part of the season like this”.

Nevertheless the seemingly unstoppable Mercedes team have stamped their authority on home soil, with German driver Nico Rosberg clinching a second career pole position for his home race.

Hamilton shot into the lead, and Rosberg exited the first corner behind both Red Bulls as well, with Verstappen slotting into second ahead of Ricciardo.

Verstappen said he had decided not to fight Ricciardo too hard when his team-mate had superior pace as the team had already discussed the possibility of their strategies differing.

“It’s a great feeling and just a great lap”, Rosberg said.

But he finished in fourth and looked a long way away from his first world championship. Massa stopped on lap 37 after sustaining damage on the opening lap, when Palmer went into the back of his Williams.

Hulkenberg, who qualified seventh for his home race, will drop to eighth as a result of the penalty.

The 31-year-old English driver heads into the holiday break with 217 points before racing resumes toward the end of August at the Belgian circuit of Spa-Francorchamps.