Nico Rosberg took the victory in a dominant performance at Interlagos.
The driver of the No. 6 Mercedes AMG Petronas car started from the pole and led all but four laps en route to scoring his 13th career win in Formula 1, fifth of the season and second at the Autódromo José Carlos Pace in São Paulo. “It was a great weekend for me. Of course everything is relative with what happened back in Paris, but it went perfectly. Lewis put on a great challenge but I was able to control it and I was really happy with that,” he said.
Teammate and reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton led four laps and finished runner-up. He said that he had good pace, but noted that it’s hard to make passes at this particular circuit. “I was behind Nico and in traffic for some time and I just killed my tires,” he added. “I don’t know if there was anyone else overtaking, unless you have a huge advantage you can’t get close.”
Sebastian Vettel rounded out the podium for the 79th time in his career in his No. 5 Scuderia Ferrari.
Kimi Räikkönen put the other Ferrari in fourth. Valtteri Bottas’s Williams Martini Racing Mercedes rounded out the top-five.
Nico Hülkenberg finished sixth in his No. 27 Sahara Force India Mercedes, followed by Daniil Kvyat finished seventh in his No. 26 Infiniti Red Bull Renault. Felipe Massa finished his home race in eighth. That however could change as he’s under investigation for his right-rear tire being 27 C – 80.6 F – over the maximum pre-race temperature limit.
Romain Grosjean finished ninth in his No. 8 Lotus-Mercedes while Max Verstappen rounded out the points in 10th in his No. 33 Scuderia Toro Rosso Renault.
American Alexander Rossi finished 19th in his last race of 2015. He’ll return to his GP2 Series ride with Racing Engineering for the next two weeks.
The only car to not finish the race was the other Toro Rosso driver Carlos Sainz Jr.
Formula 1 closes out the 2015 season in two weeks at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi.
