Here’s Giles Richards’ report from Portimāo.
Verstappen’s fastest lap on the 66th lap was deleted for exceeding track limits, meaning Hamilton is eight points clear in the standings.
Today's finals standings
- Hamilton (Mercedes)
- Verstappen (Red Bull, +29.148)
- Bottas (Mercedes, +33.530 and fastest lap)
- Perez (Red Bull, +39.735)
- Norris (McLaren, +51.369)
- Leclerc (Ferrari, +55.781)
- Ocon (Alpine, +63.749)
- Alonso (Alpine, +64.808)
- Ricciardo (McLaren, +75.3691
- Gasly (Alpha Tauri, +76.463)
- . Sainz (Ferrari, +78.955)
- . Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo, one lap)
- . Vettel (Aston Martin, one lap)
- . Stroll (Aston Martin, one lap)
- . Tsunoda (Alpha Tauri, one lap)
- . Russell (Williams, one lap)
- . Schumacher (Haas, one lap)
- . Latifi (Williams, two laps)
- . Mazepin (Haas, two laps)
- DNF - Raikkonen (Alfa Romeo)
Lewis Hamilton speaks.
That was such a tough race, physically and mentally. It was very windy out there. I was not happy about losing out on the restart. With Valtteri, I managed to get him a turn one. The next few days is about recovering, and getting back as quickly as possible. Today wasn’t all perfect.
“That’s a bit odd,” says Verstappen of his loss of an extra point. “But whatever. Let’s see what we can do in Barcelona.”
Oh. Verstappen loses the fastest lap, as he went off at turn 14. Bottas takes the fastest lap point off him. That’s bad news for Red Bull.
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Lewis Hamilton wins the Portuguese GP!
A masterclass from Hamilton, and he takes 25 points to stay in the lead. Verstappen takes the fastest lap and an extra point and 19 points.
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66/66 Serenity, thy name is Hamilton. Does he want to pit to try and win the fastest lap? Too much to risk and not enough laps. They won’t be bothering. Bottas lands the fastest lap, leaving it in Verstappen’s hands on the final lap.
65/66 Verstappen comes into the pits to do the same, and try and steal a fastest lap. The pit was 1.9 seconds. Lighting stuff.
64/66 Bottas to make a pit stop to try and steal the fastest lap on softer tyres. He has a clear track ahead of him, and keeps third, with Perez behind him.
63/66 Perez still has the fastest lap, while Alonso is up there too. Mick Schumacher in the Haas takes 16th. “Yes, yes,” he says.
62/66 At the back, Mick Schumacher chases down Nicholas Latifi for 17th.
61/66 Hamilton is comfortable, and cruising ahead. Mercedes eyeing another stop for Bottas and a tyre change to get a fastest lap.
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60/66 Alonso is in eighth, ahead of Sainz. Norris in fifth has been unable to make any impression on the top four. Nobody can, in truth.
59/66 Bottas’s problem was a sensor issue, apparently. All sorted now. Hi-tech stuff can go wrong. Seems it was on his exhaust.
58/66 Perez is 25 seconds off Bottas. Barring an accident, he’s a fair way off landing third.
57/66 Ten laps to go, and Perez sets a fastest lap with those soft tyres. Part of the plan going according to plan.
56/66 Some concern that Bottas is losing power. How’s your luck? Perez could be circling.
55/66 Hamilton sets a fastest lap. “The pace is strong,” he says. He’s not wrong.
54/66 Bottas chasing Verstappen down now for a Mercedes 1-2. Ricciardo and Gasly are battling it out for tenth, that final point available.
53/66 Hamilton leads Verstappen by 4.7 seconds, and Perez has been told his softer tyres were put in to take a fastest lap and a point off Hamilton. That could be useful in the world title race.
52/66 Perez comes in, just as Ricciardo loses his place to Alonso, who was flying to take tenth. Perez drops to fourth as Mazepin gets a five second penalty for holding him up a couple of laps ago.
51/66 Hamilton takes the lead off Perez down the pit straight. Nice and easy. Perez will soon head for the pits.
50/66 Mercedes look much improved from pre-season, and Red Bull’s progress doesn’t seem so giant when Hamilton is the master of conditions like these. He’s half a second off Perez.
49/66 Perez is doing a good job of holding up the Mercedes and perhaps letting in the Red Bull of Verstappen. Ricciardo takes ninth off Gasly, who then drops out of the points as Alonso comes past him to take tenth.
48/66 Hamilton now closer to Perez, who was supposed to change his tyres on lap 52.
47/66 Perez not happy as Mazepin, in 19th, comes across him as he tries to lap him. No such problem with Hamilton who flies past.
46/66 The Mercedes are still flying. Bottas is in within range of Verstappen, while Hamilton closes on Perez, still to pit. Bottas takes another fastest lap.
45/66 Ocon goes into eighth beyond Carlos Sainz. Ferrari very much mid-table.
44/66 Mercedes look to be doing much better on the harder tyres than Red Bull. They are flying along.
43/66 Ricciardo ended up dropping to tenth. Bottas sets a fastest lap again as he chases down Verstappen.
42/66 We are in something of a phoney war before Perez pits. Hamilton sets a fastest lap. Ricciardo pits, and was in fifth, but drops to ninth as it was a little slow.
40/66 Perez leads by 12 seconds while Hamilton is around three seconds clear of Verstappen.
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39/66 With Perez yet to pit the next three are on hard tyres. Perez and Red Bull are now hoping for a safety car and a quick pit.
38/66 Hamilton pits, and Perez takes the lead. Hamilton comes a long way clear of Verstappen. The Mercedes pit was 2.5 seconds, a little slower than he might have liked.
37/66 Verstappen is in fourth, Perez in third. Bottas comes in, and his pit is slower than Verstappen’s but he comes out ahead to stay in third. Perez is in second. And then Verstappen steals in to take third. Bottas locked up and again he was overtaken.
36/66 Here we go, here’s a pit stop and here comes Verstappen. What tyres has he gone with? He’s gone with hard tyres. Bottas will try and put some pace on to make sure he gains some time to make his own stop.
34/66 Ocon passes Gasly to go 11th. There hasn’t been a great deal of action, even in the minor places.
33/66 We await a tyre change. Hamilton was complaining about his tyres 20 laps ago but seems to be doing just fine.
32/66 It’s two Mercedes, two Red Bull - Hamilton, Bottas, Verstappen and Perez in the top four. As expected? Yes, very much so.
31/66 Hamilton sets another fastest lap, while Bottas is 0.3 of a second quicker than Verstappen. It’s a Mercedes procession as we approach halfway.
30/66 That 3.5 seconds gap nears and Bottas will surely pit soon. Vertstappen is 0.578 behind Bottas.
29/66 “If the gap goes above 3.5 seconds we’ll pit first,” says Mercedes’ pit to Bottas. Verstappen is complaining about his gearbox, third gear to be precise.
27/66 None of the current top seven has yet to make a pit stop. Verstappen sitting patiently off Bottas. He didn’t like the conditions in qualifying and they don’t seem to suit him today.
26/66 Hamilton sets a fastest lap, really putting the hammer down now.
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25/66 Gasly, in ninth, goes into the pits, and Sainz goes up to tenth.
24/66 Verstappen has Bottas in his sights, while Hamilton has almost 1.9 seconds on Bottas.
23/66 Verstappen in DRS range of Bottas. Sainz goes into the pits, and he drops down 11th.
22/66 Sainz in the Ferrari changes from soft to medium, and drops to 15th. Ferrari have not made much impression in this race.
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21/66 And that’s the difference between Hamilton and Bottas. A small mistake, and Hamilton seizes on it. Did Bottas’s tyres seem to let him down? The truth is that Hamilton is his superior. Now Verstappen might smell blood.
20/66 Wonderful from Hamilton, and he sees an angle off the main straight as Bottas takes a position on the right and Hamilton goes the long way round, and takes the lead.
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19/66 Verstappen getting closer? Bottas and Hamilton appeared concerned with each other.
18/66 Ricciardo blazes past Vettel to land himself tenth, and into the points. He’s the progressive one in the pack.
17/66 It’s windy and on the 13th turn both Hamilton and Bottas make something of a mess of it.
16/66 Verstappen is lagging behind the Mercedes pair. This appears to be a race centred on whether Bottas holds his nerve with Hamilton up his behind for another 50 laps.
15/66 Norris let Perez through - or did he? That’s the end of the dispute for now. There’s a suggestion his tyres were the reason for the Red Bull being past him rather than any sense of gentlemanly conduct.
14/66 Daniel Ricciardo, from 16th to 11th, has made the most progress of anyone so far. Hamilton has set the fastest lap as he chases down Bottas.
13/66 Verstappen becoming detached from the Mercedes, and that may well be the last of the racing up front. There seems to be a dispute between Perez and Norris, with Red Bull suggesting Norris took fourth place illegally.
12/66 Bottas, in first, has 0.8 of a second on his teammate. Verstappen is almost two seconds of Hamilton and complaining to his team that he doesn’t have enough power. Hamilton now looks comfortable.
11/66 A minor mistake from Verstappen, he took a corner too wide, and then Hamilton steals in, at turn 14. Hamilton is in like Flynn. That’s why he’s the best. Utterly fearless in seizing the chance.
10/66 Verstappen has Hamilton hanging on to him, but only just.
9/66 Bottas and Verstappen are very close - within 0.6 seconds of each other, and Hamilton is a second behind Verstappen, by far the quickest in the field.
8/66 Bottas set the fastest lap in speeding away from the pack. His move was not much help to Hamilton. That was a great overtake by Verstappen who read Bottas’ braking very well.
7/66 They queue up behind Bottas and he gets the jump on the field as the safety car withdraws and Verstappen has overtaken Hamilton. He got the jump on the world champion. Norris up to fourth ahead of Perez. That’s good and bad for both Mercedes and Red Bull. Verstappen will try and chase down Bottas.
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6/66 Hamilton also worried about his brakes as the safety car’s service is about to be discontinued. His Mercedes team tell him not to worry.
5/66 More safety car action, and safety is the key here. And it looks like another lap will follow this. Seems the race controller is worried about something on the track.
4/66 Poor Kimi’s car is being lifted out of there. The longest serving driver had the shortest race of all. The debris on the straight has been cleared and the Alfa has been removed. Bottas tells his team that his rear brakes are “very hot”.
3/66 Race over for Raikkonen, that didn’t last long. And the field edges along behind the safety car as running repairs are made to the track.
2/66 Kimi Raikkonen’s wing spins off, after he clashes with Giovanazzi, his Alfa teammate, and we have a safety car, just like in the first two races of the season. The field goes through the pit lane to escape the debris.
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And away we go...
Bottas takes the lead into turn one, Hamilton behind him. Perez is slow, and looks to be struggling for grip. Verstappen holds on in third. Sainz gets ahead of Perez. Norris climbs up to sixth. Bottas closes out the first lap in the lead.
Bottas, on pole, is warming up his tyres as he weaves his car at the head of the field. Then a series of tests of the brakes as they all line up in position.
The drivers are in their cars, revving away ahead of the parade lap. The finishing touches are being taken, and as the expensively sponsored clock counts down, away they go into the formation lap.
Lewis Hamilton speaks.
It’s been really difficult all week with the wind in the afternoon. Some places you have a crosswind, a headwind, a tailwind. That’s what makes things so difficult in qualifying, I feel good. I think it will be a difficult race. There will be some interesting opportunities.
As the drivers make their way to their cars through the back of the grid we are treated to some pre-race entertainment with a rendition of the Portuguese national anthem and a fly-past by the Portuguese airforce.
The title standings after two races are:
- Hamilton: 44 points
- Verstappen: 43 points
- Norris: 27 points
- LeClerc: 20 points
Lewis Hamilton is one of 12 drivers boycotting social media this weekend, and we are too at Guardian Sport. So there will be no use of tweets, which makes this a little harder to do.
Giles Richards spoke to Sebastian Vettel out in Portugal this week.
Preamble
Grip appears to be the major factor in this weekend’s GP, with many of the drivers complaining of their lack of it during qualifying. Portimão will be a stern test of a driver’s ability to keep control of their car. Valtteri Bottas is on pole, with Lewis Hamilton behind him, and Max Verstappen in third. Verstappen will have two Mercedes in front of him as he tries to build on his win at Imola two weeks ago. Hamilton and Mercedes have not had it all their own way so far this season as Red Bull have looked quicker when the track suits their greater pace. Portugal may not be that track so a Lewis Hamilton win has to be favoured.
- 1 Valtteri Bottas (Fin) Mercedes GP 1min 18.348secs
- 2 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) Mercedes GP 1:18.355
- 3 Max Verstappen (Ned) Red Bull 1:18.746
- 4 Sergio Perez (Mex) Red Bull 1:18.890
- 5 Carlos Sainz Jr (Spa) Ferrari 1:19.039
- 6 Esteban Ocon (Fra) Alpine 1:19.042
- 7 Lando Norris (Gbr) McLaren 1:19.116
- 8 Charles Leclerc (Mon) Ferrari 1:19.306,
- 9 Pierre Gasly (Fra) Scuderia AlphaTauri 1:19.475
- 10 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Aston Martin 1:19.659
- 11 George Russell (Gbr) Williams 1:19.109
- 12 Antonio Giovinazzi (Ita) Alfa Romeo Racing 1:19.216
- 13 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Alpine 1:19.456
- 14 Yuki Tsunoda (Jpn) Scuderia AlphaTauri 1:19.463
- 15 Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Alfa Romeo Racing 1:19.812
- 16 Daniel Ricciardo (Aus) McLaren 1:19.839
- 17 Lance Stroll (Can) Aston Martin 1:19.913
- 18 Nicholas Latifi (Can) Williams 1:20.285
- 19 Mick Schumacher (Ger) Haas F1 1:20.452
- 20 Nikita Mazepin (Raf) Haas F1 1:20.912
