It hasn’t even been a full twelve months since their last visit, but Formula One has headed back to the former Winter Olympic Park in Sochi for the Russian Grand Prix. Join The Roar for a live blog of the race, starting at 10pm AEST.
Round four of the championship will see the drivers tackle this semi-street circuit, with the infamous Turn 3 left-hander – spanning close to 800 metres in length.
The race itself will be 53 laps, on what is one of the longer circuits on the calendar, at 5.8km.
Pirelli have stuck to the same three compounds of tyre seen in the first three races of the season; the medium, soft and supersoft.
With the Sochi circuit being friendly on the rubber, it is expected that the race will see drivers only stop once for tyres, or at most twice.
Qualifying once again highlighted Mercedes AMG’s supremacy, with Nico Rosberg’s pole position lap being seven tenths faster than the nearest competitor.
After three consecutive wins in 2016, the stars continue to align for the German with his teammate Lewis Hamilton once again succumbing to the same power-unit gremlin that put him out of qualifying in China.
Issues continue to compartmentalise for Ferrari, with Sebastian Vettel enduring a five-place grid penalty for the race, after the team opted to replace the damaged gearbox from his contact with teammate Kimi Räikkönen at the Chinese Grand Prix.
Nevertheless there is great pressure riding on the Scuderia, who are yet to deliver upon their promise for ‘early wins’ in 2016.
Benefitting will be the two Finns. Valtteri Bottas for Williams will lead his compatriot Räikkönen from his inherited second place on the grid. Forget not their infamous final lap clash during the 2015 edition of this race.
Red Bull’s power deficiency showed during qualifying, as Williams got the better of the Tag-Heuer powered squad. Daniel Ricciardo did however out-qualify his Russian teammate in Daniil Kvyat.
Sergio Perez, who will be elevated to sixth due to the Vettel penalty, was another standout on the Saturday. The Force India team have not started 2016 as they may have hoped, but with the podium result they achieved here last year, a decent bag of points could be on the cards.
The predicted one-stop race should produce an interesting affair, however perhaps not as manic as China. Nevertheless there should be battles all-over.
Join me please, from 10pm AEST on The Roar for full coverage of the Russian Grand Prix.
anon
Guest
Horrible dreary race. All worth it to see Hamilton miserable on the podium though.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Pleasure as always. :)
Thanks for the call mate, was switching between this and Man U vs Leicester
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
This F1 odyssey will continue to the west, when they head to Barcelona in a fortnight's time. Until then, thanks all for joining me for the coverage and for your feedback. Good night and I'll be back for the Spanish Grand Prix!
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
He asked the same question to all three of them. Imagine if one of them said "no, we don't like it here."
OMG that interview with Putin in the winners room was super awkward... "Do you like it here in Russia..." Like seriously!
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
So it's a perfect 100 points for Rosberg then after the first four races. 43 points ahead of his nearest rival in Hamilton. Once again, fate and circumstance has transpired against his competitors, with Hamilton having his reliability dramas in qualifying that cost him a potential front-row start and then the first lap termination of Vettel. That incident was blatantly Kvyat's fault and unlike China where he was innocent, there needs to be some words of apology to the furious German, who takes a severe hit in the driver's standings. Though he is helped a little by the fact that neither Red Bull scored, as that first lap clash also affected Ricciardo's race. Unfortunate race too for Williams who couldn't convert their qualifying speed into race speed, as they miss out on the podium. Fourth and fifth does though give them a boost in the standings. We see in the points for the first time in 2016; Alonso, Magnussen, Perez and Button. Two McLarens in the points and Magnussen scoring Renault's first points since their return to F1 as a manufacturer.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
-------- DRIVER'S -------- 100 - Nico Rosberg 57 -- Lewis Hamilton 43 -- Kimi Räikkönen 36 -- Daniel Ricciardo 33 -- Sebastian Vettel 32 -- Felipe Massa 22 -- Romain Grosjean 21 -- Daniil Kvyat 19 -- Valtteri Bottas 13 -- Max Verstappen 8 --- Fernando Alonso 6 --- Kevin Magnussen 6 --- Nico Hulkenberg 4 --- Carlos Sainz 2 --- Sergio Perez 1 --- Jenson Button 1 --- Stoffel Vandoorne 0 --- Jolyon Palmer 0 --- Marcus Ericsson 0 --- Pascal Wehrlein 0 --- Felipe Nasr 0 --- Esteban Gutierrez 0 --- Rio Haryanto
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
----- CONSTRUCTOR'S ----- 157 - Mercedes AMG 76 -- Scuderia Ferrari 57 -- Red Bull Racing 51 -- Williams Mercedes 22 -- Haas Ferrari 17 -- Scuderia Toro Rosso 10 -- McLaren Honda 8 --- Force India Mercedes 6 --- Renault Sport 0 --- Sauber Ferrari 0 --- Manor Mercedes
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
PODIUM INTERVIEWS - Hosted by Martin Brundle: ROSBERG - "I was enjoying it out there." HAMILTON - "It was not the easiest first corner." "There wasn't a doubt in my mind that I could win this." RÄIKKÖNEN - "We want to win races and put two cars up as far up as we can." "We just don't have the speed."
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
The results then after the 53 lap race. 1 N. Rosberg 2 L. Hamilton 3 K. Räikkönen 4 V. Bottas 5 F. Massa 6 F. Alonso 7 K. Magnussen 8 R. Grosjean 9 S. Perez 10 J. Button 11 D. Ricciardo 12 C. Sainz* 13 J. Palmer 14 M. Ericsson 15 D. Kvyat 16 F. Nasr* 17 E. Gutierrez 18 P. Wehrlein RET M. Verstappen RET S. Vettel RET N. Hulkenberg RET R. Haryanto Time penalties are yet to be applied to Carlos Sainz and Felipe Nasr, who respectively take 10 and 5 seconds onto their end race times.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 53/53: FINAL LAP And NICO ROSBERG makes it four from four at the Russian Grand Prix! Another cruise to victory for the German. LEWIS HAMILTON completes the 30th one-two finish for Mercedes AMG, driving admirably from tenth. And KIMI RÄIKKÖNEN writes a piece of history for Ferrari, by claiming Scuderia's 700th podium with that third placed finish.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 52/53: 1:39.094 a final fast lap for Rosberg, who looks like he will complete the grand slam with the win, pole position and the fastest lap of the race.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 51/53: Ricciardo grabs P12 off Palmer and will be elevated to P11, with the time penalty looming for Sainz. Still as it stands, Red Bull will score no points.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 50/53: FOUR LAPS TO GO Grosjean making his car very wide against Perez, who may have a shot at Magnussen who still sits in seventh.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 49/53: Button right on the exhaust of Sainz and he finally emerges into the points, with the Toro Rosso driver locking up.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Still chasing his $4 million lawsuit? Maybe Vlad'll help him.
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 47/53: And it appears Mr Putin has arrived... Massa pitting from P5 for another set of supersoft tyres and it'll be a free stop as Alonso is still a while behind in P6.
Bayden Westerweller
Roar Guru
Plugged into the matrix... shifting beads on the abacus...
Jawad Yaqub
Roar Guru
Lap 46/53: Interesting to see Kimi continue to plug in those green sectors relative to Hamilton. Gap is now 10 seconds.