F1 Turkish GP: Valtteri Bottas grabs P1 holding on to his pole position after qualifying at Istanbul. Redbull duo behind each other after Bottas, while Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc takes the fourth position.
Bottas made a great start, made those intermediate tyres last and kept his concentration too, not panicking when it looked like Leclerc might try and make it to the end on the same set of tyres. Hats off to Bottas, that was a professional display.
“It’s been a while but it feels good. From my side, one of the best races I’ve had – everything was under control. Everything went smooth for once for me. When’s there’s only one dry line – difficult one,” said the race leader Valtteri Bottas.
Max Verstappen was focused as always to hold onto the second position. The stretagy also worked wonders for him as the new Inters looked quite pacey at last.
“It was not easy today, the track was greasy and we had to manage the tyres the whole race. Valtteri had a bit more pace, but we are happy to finish second – it’s easy to get it wrong and drop back,” says Verstappen.
The championship lead has swung back to Verstappen. He has a six point gap to Hamilton, which for much of the race, looked like being just the one point.
Lewis Hamilton although winning the qualifying with flying colours started 11th due to a new engine grid penalty, poured himself into the F1 Turkish GP overtaking cars after cars.
He was firm in his belief to finish the race in the first stint of tires which he started the race. His crew however, believed in the opposite and made Lewis to make a pit stop after which his pace dropped considerably which gave Lewis no chance to improve further and even he was on verge to be overtaken by Gasly and finished P5.
Lando Norris finished P6 while his team mate dropped out of the points to 13th place.
The first one to try a dry tyre was Sebastian Vettel which proved a nightmare for the Aston Martin driver throwing himself to 18th place. His teammate however had a good race gaining some championship points for himself in the 9th position.
Ferrari were looking good in this particular race. Another driver who was climbing the positions fast was Carlos Sainz who started the race 15th and still managing to finish 8th.
Alpine had a fine qualifying but an early spin in the first lap by Fernando Alonso lost the momentum from which they could recover. Their other driver barely made the tenth position above both Alfa Romeos.
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