Rosberg dominates in the streets of Baku

Nico Rosberg won the European Grand Prix at the Baku City Circuit in Azerbaijan after dominating every single lap. Sebastian Vettel was 2^nd for Ferrari and Sergio Pérez got his second podium of the season for Force India after a great recovery from 7^th.

The race had a clean start with only Pérez and Verstappen making up positions within the top 10. Kvyat started losing positions very soon and would retire on lap 7. His teammate Carlos Sainz, as well as both Red Bulls, had to pit very early for the soft tyre due to a high degradation on the supersoft.

Rosberg, Vettel, Pérez, Hamilton and Bottas decided to stay out while the rest of the drivers had got rid of the supersoft tyres with graining. Ricciardo was P6 ahead of Hülkenberg, who had started with the softs and hadn’t pitted yet and was pursued by Räikkönen. Massa and Verstappen completed the top 10, while Wehrlein held on to P11 without pitting.

Hamilton‘s pit stop allowed him to come back on track ahead of Verstappen on P9. Pérez answered by pitting one lap later in order to avoid an undercut. They both overtook Ricciardo at the main straight, while Hülkenberg and Verstappen chose alternative strategies and chose the supersoft and the medium compounds respectively. Ricciardo decided to pit for the medium as well and came out behind Hülkenberg and a long line of cars going from Nasr (P11) to Sainz (P8).

Halfway through the race, Rosberg led ahead of Räikkönen and Vettel, who were on different strategies with Kimi going for a 2-stop strategy which he managed to avoid by taking good care of his tyres. Pérez tried to chase Räikkönen on 4^th, while Hamilton struggled with his car settings on 5^th. Bottas, Hülkenberg, Ricciardo, Massa and Verstappen were in the top 10.

Finally, nobody was able to beat Nico Rosberg and his Mercedes. Sebastian Vettel finished 2^nd closing the weekend with a good recovery after a terrible start for Ferrari on free practice. Sergio Pérez completed the podium in spite of his grid penalty which forced him to start 7^th following his accident in FP3. Räikkönen, Hamilton, Bottas, Ricciardo, Verstappen, Hülkenberg and Massa completed the top 10, while Button, Nasr, Grosjean, Magnussen, Palmer, Gutiérrez, Ericsson and Haryanto were the other survivors. Alonso retired due to gearbox problems, Wehlein had no brakes and both Toro Rosso had rear suspension issues.

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