Hamilton wins Spanish GP, Vettel comes second

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton won the Spanish GP after an exciting battle with Ferrari rival Sebastian Vettel. With this win, Hamilton has managed to cut short Vettel's championship lead from 13 to 6 points. Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo came in third to clock his first podium finish of the season.

The race started with Lewis Hamilton on pole, ahead of Sebastian Vettel, Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen. The British driver suffered some wheel spin at the start, which helped Vettel to take the lead as they entered turn 1 of the first lap. Meanwhile, there was a slight contact between Bottas and Raikkonen that shunted the latter's Ferrari into the Red Bull of Max Verstappen who was trying to overtake them on the outside. This crash resulted in suspension damage on the Ferrari and the Red Bull, thus eliminating Raikkonen and Verstappen from the race. Meanwhile, Felipe Massa's Williams made contact with Fernando Alonso's car pushing the McLaren off track. Both the drivers carried on after the incident and Alonso managed to finish in 12th position ahead of Filipe Massa.

At the front, Vettel managed to pull away from Hamilton and established a satisfactory gap. However, Ferrari decided to pit the German earlier in the race. Vettel thus came into the pits on lap 15 and switched to a new set of soft tyres. Hamilton led the race till the 21st lap, before going into the pits for a new set of mediums. This put Valtteri Bottas into the lead, though he was yet to make a pit stop. However, Mercedes decided to keep Bottas out for a bit longer in order to hold up Sebastian Vettel.

Bottas managed to contain Vettel for some time, while Hamilton cut short the German's lead by around 2 seconds per lap. Vettel finally managed to get past Bottas' Mercedes, while Hamilton too overtook his team mate soon after. Hamilton now started to clock lap times that were in close proximity to that of Vettel, despite the fact that the Mercedes was running on slower medium tyres.

Mercedes were also helped by a Virtual Safety Car (VSC) deployment in lap 34, after Stoffel Vandoorne's McLaren collided with Felipe Massa's Williams. Mercedes pitted Hamilton for a new set of soft tyres under the VSC, which helped him maintain his track position. Ferrari too brought Vettel in for a set of medium tyres in lap 38. While Vettel came out of the pits, he found himself alongside Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes, with both the drivers attacking turn 1 wheel-to-wheel. But since the Ferrari was on the inside, Vettel managed to take away the lead from Hamilton.

However, the Mercedes was now on faster soft tyres, as compared to the mediums on the Ferrari. Hamilton thus managed to overtake Vettel under DRS, thus getting into the race leading position. He then nursed the ageing set of tyres to finish around 3.5 seconds ahead of the Ferrari. Meanwhile, Ricciardo came third, but was 75.82 seconds behind the race leader. Bottas retired from the race on lap 39 due to a powertrain failure.

Force India recorded their best performance ever, with Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon finishing fourth and fifth. Renault's Niko Hulkenberg crossed the finish line in sixth position. The two Toro Rosso's of Carlos Sainz and Daniil Kvyat were split on the seventh and ninth position by Sauber's Pascal Wehrlein, despite him suffering from a 5 second penalty. Haas' Roman Grosjean finished tenth, thus completing the points table for the Spanish GP.

The Formula 1 paddock will now move to Monaco in two weeks' time. The current world driver championship standings are:

1. Sebastian Vettel - 104

2. Lewis Hamilton - 98

3. Valtteri Bottas - 63