Verstappen closes in on record-chasing Hamilton

 
• ALFA ROMEO-FERRARI
• [7] Kimi Räikkönen (FIN) | Entries 332 (329 starts) Poles 18 Wins 21 🏆
• [99] Antonio Giovinazzi (ITA) | Entries 40 (40 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0

◾️ Continuity is the word at ALFA ROMEO where the 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen and Antonio Giovinazzi have retained their places for a third season in a row in a team which has finished eighth in the Constructors' Championship for the last two years (or three years, if you count the final iteration of its predecessor Sauber with a different driver line-up). To be honest, Alfa Romeo could perhaps have done with a bit of a shake-up and it is difficult to see any better offering from the Swiss-based operation this time around, especially if Raikkonen winds down slowly towards his retirement. After all, Giovinazzi has only had a handful of points finishes from his 40 starts, although he did at least evenly split the eight points which the team earned last year.

• ALPHA TAURI-HONDA
• [10] Pierre Gasly (FRA) | Entries 64 (64 starts) Poles 0 Wins 1
• [22] Yuki Tsunoda (JPN) | Rookie

◾️ ALPHA TAURI provides one of the most fascinating line-ups of the season as rookie Yuki Tsunoda takes a seat alongside race winner Pierre Gasly who delighted his Italian team with a completely unexpected home victory at Monza after a crazy Italian Grand Prix in September. Gasly may have been the beneficiary of a well-timed pit-stop on that day - but the 25-year-old from Rouen in France also appears to have natural talent in abundance. Meanwhile, Tsunoda is a complete enigma for now - although it was plain to see that the first Japanese driver in a Formula One car since Kamui Kobayashi in 2014 was lightning quick in testing. Just how much raw pace Tsunoda has when the real stuff begins will determine the long-term prospects of the Honda-backed man.

• ALPINE-RENAULT
• [14] Fernando Alonso (ESP) | Entries 314 (311 starts) Poles 22 Wins 32 🏆🏆
• [31] Esteban Ocon (FRA) | Entries 67 (67 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0

◾️ Renault has rebranded its Formula One team as ALPINE to promote its sports car brand - but, while the name on the grid is new, it is an old flame in Fernando Alonso which the French outfit welcomes back. The veteran Spaniard won back-to-back titles with the team in 2005 and 2006, and after more recently winning consecutive Le Mans 24 races in 2018 and 2019 - and racing in the Indy500 three times - he returns to the format which first put him in the spotlight. Alongside Alonso, Frenchman Esteban Ocon retains his seat hoping to build on his second place at the crazy 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix in what will be his fourth Formula One campaign. But any hopes are tempered by the feeling that the whole set-up of Alpine continues to give off the appearance of an archetypal mid-table team. 

• ASTON MARTIN-MERCEDES
• [5] Sebastian Vettel (GER) | Entries 258 (257 starts) Poles 57 Wins 53 🏆🏆🏆🏆
• [18] Lance Stroll (CAN) | Entries 79 (78 starts) Poles 1 Wins 0

◾️ ASTON MARTIN makes a long-awaited return to Formula One in 2021 with the marque appearing for the first time as a works team since 1960. The Silverstone-based outfit will retain its British Racing Green livery from 61 years ago and, like its immediate predecessor Racing Point, will be powered by a Mercedes engine. Four-time champion Sebastian Vettel arrives following a difficult time at Ferrari - but, now seven years on from his last title, it remains to be seen if this will be anything more than a three-year farewell tour for the German. Lance Stroll retains the other seat to the surprise of nobody at all, considering his own father is a part-owner of the team - and, amid infuriating inconsistency, the Canadian has struggled to shrug off the daddy's boy reputation. Simply put, Stroll needs to produce more regularly the performance-level which has brought him some occasional bright moments, most notably when he stepped on the podium in Monza and at the Sakhir Grand Prix.

• FERRARI
• [16] Charles Leclerc (MON) | Entries 59 (59 starts) Poles 7 Wins 2
• [55] Carlos Sainz Jr (ESP) | Entries 119 (118 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0

◾️ FERRARI begins the 2021 campaign with the simple aim of restoring respectability to its name after a horrendous and, at times, utterly humiliating 2020 season. The Prancing Horse looked more like a donkey, ambling around tracks all over the world without a threat and eventually finishing sixth in the Constructors' Championship for its worst result in 40 years. Nevertheless, a new year brings fresh hope with Monégasque youngster Charles Leclerc looking to reproduce the consistently excellent drives which brought him back-to-back Grand Prix wins in Spa and Monza in 2019 and several other podium visits. Although without a race win yet, team-mate Carlos Sainz Jr is certainly no stranger to the post-race ceremonials, only just missing out on the top step of the podium in Monza last year. Sainz also finished last season with McLaren on a strong run of seven successive points finishes - and so taking Ferrari back towards the big time looks well within the capabilities of this pair of Charlies.

• HAAS-FERRARI
• [9] Nikita Mazepin (RUS) | Rookie
• [47] Mick Schumacher (GER) | Rookie

◾️ All change at HAAS where a pair of rookies - Nikita Mazepin and Mick Schumacher - replace the departing Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen. Schumacher - the son of seven-time champion Michael - views this opportunity as the first step towards him emulating his legendary father. But, if anything, the announcement of Mazepin has caused more of a stir. The Russian, who is racing under a neutral flag in line with conditions set by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, was previously revealed to have uploaded a video to social media in which he filmed himself awkwardly groping a female passenger’s breast in a car. The hashtag #WeSayNoToMazepin has trended on several occasions in the close season - and it is fortunate for him that he seems to have joined a team with low expectations on and off the track.

• MCLAREN-MERCEDES
• [44] Daniel Ricciardo (AUS) | Entries 188 (188 starts) Poles 3 Wins 7
• [77] Lando Norris (GBR) | Entries 38 (38 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0

◾️ MCLAREN heads into 2021 at its most positive in years following its rather surprising third place in the Constructors' Championship last season. Although the impressive Carlos Sainz Jr has now moved to Ferrari, much of the positivity has stayed in the team and is down to prodigious British talent Lando Norris. The 21-year-old Bristolian marked his second season last year with two fastest laps, consistent points finishes, and a podium at the season-opening Austrian Grand Prix - but the likeable lad is far from the finished article. McLaren has therefore made an eminently sensible move to bring in Daniel Ricciardo from Red Bull - the Aussie already has three pole positions and seven Grand Prix wins to his name so will keep Norris honest. As such, despite the loss of Sainz, McLaren remains in decent shape to take the fight to the current top two.

• MERCEDES
• [44] Sir Lewis Hamilton (GBR) | Entries 266 (266 starts) Poles 98 Wins 95 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆
• [77] Valtteri Bottas (FIN) | Entries 157 (156 starts) Poles 16 Wins 9

◾️ Dominant MERCEDES racked up a seventh consecutive Constructors' Championship in 2020 as Lewis Hamilton exhausted all of the superlatives by drawing level on seven World Drivers' Championships with Michael Schumacher. It was a truly special year for Hamilton as he went beyond the iconic German in regard to number of Grand Prix victories - chalking up a record 92nd race win at the Portuguese Grand Prix in October. In all, Hamilton won 11 of the 17 races contested in 2020, even taking the chequered flag with bald tyres at the Turkish Grand Prix. At times, Hamilton was simply untouchable with even team-mate Valtteri Bottas regularly blitzed by the Stevenage-born racer. The Finn did have his moments with victories in Austria and Russia - but generally he was just as caught up in Hamilton's tidal wave of success as anyone else. More record-breaking looked set to follow this year with the announcement that major regulation changes had been delayed until 2022 due to the coronavirus pandemic - but, in something of a twist to the expected narrative, Red Bull has looked strong enough in the run-up to the new campaign for Mercedes to wheel out the mind-games ahead of lights out.

• RED BULL-HONDA
• [11] Sergio Pérez (MEX) | Entries 195 (191 starts) Poles 0 Wins 1
• [33] Max Verstappen (NED) | Entries 119 (119 starts) Poles 3 Wins 10

◾️ RED BULL finished its 2020 campaign on a high as Max Verstappen's victory in the season-closing Abu Dhabi Grand Prix ensured the team maintained its record of achieving at least one race win in every season since 2016. That single, almost apologetically belated, success will have buoyed the Red Bull garage after a year in which the team will have yet again felt distinctly second-best behind Mercedes. Nevertheless, 2021 surely will be closer - race-winner Sergio Perez moves in to take a well-deserved seat alongside Verstappen having finally broken his duck at the Sakhir Grand Prix on his 190th start. Certainly, the Mexican should be of more assistance to Verstappen at the front of the grid than the underperforming Alex Albon - but, with Checo now on the wrong side of 30, Red Bull will be pinning its main hopes on its fiercely-determined young Dutchman.

• WILLIAMS-MERCEDES
• [6] Nicholas Latifi (CAN) | Entries 17 (17 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0
• [63] George Russell (GBR) | Entries 38 (38 starts) Poles 0 Wins 0

◾️ George Russell got a taste of the high life when, as a Mercedes test driver, he stood in for Lewis Hamilton at the Sakhir Grand Prix, led most of the race, set a fastest lap, and won his first points in Formula One. In fairness to Russell, he should have scored those maiden points earlier in the season for WILLIAMS at the Imola Grand Prix. However, the promising Norfolk-born driver made a critical error when warming his tyres behind the safety car while sitting in 10th - and so Williams was condemned to a first pointless season in its history. A blue-and-white livery for 2021 harks back to the team's halcyon days in the 1980s and 1990s - but even just a single point this year from Russell or his Canadian companion Nicholas Latifi will be considered progress and a cause for celebration at the team's base in Grove.

🏁

◾️ 2021 GRAND PRIX RACE CALENDAR ◾️

(1)	28-March	4pm	BAHRAIN	Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir
(2)	18-April	2pm	EMILIA ROMAGNA	Imola Circuit, Imola
(3)	02-May	3pm	PORTUGAL	Algarve International Circuit, Portimão
(4)	09-May	2pm	SPAIN	Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, Montmeló
(5)	23-May	2pm	MONACO	Circuit de Monaco, Monte Carlo
(6)	06-June	1pm	AZERBAIJAN	Baku City Circuit, Baku
(7)	13-June	7pm	CANADA	Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Montréal
(8)	27-June	2pm	FRANCE	Circuit Paul Ricard, Le Castellet
(9)	04-July	2pm	AUSTRIA	Red Bull Ring, Spielberg
(10)	18-July	3pm	GREAT BRITAIN	Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone
(11)	01-August	2pm	HUNGARY	Hungaroring, Mogyoród
(12)	29-August	2pm	BELGIUM	Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, Stavelot
(13)	05-September	2pm	NETHERLANDS	Circuit Zandvoort, Zandvoort
(14)	12-September	2pm	ITALY	Monza Circuit, Monza
(15)	26-September	1pm	RUSSIA	Sochi Autodrom, Sochi
(16)	03-October	1pm	SINGAPORE	Marina Bay Street Circuit, Singapore
(17)	10-October	6am	JAPAN	Suzuka International Course, Suzuka
(18)	24-October	8pm	UNITED STATES	Circuit of the Americas, Austin, TX
(19)	31-October	7pm	MEXICO	Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, Mexico City
(20)	07-November	5pm	BRAZIL	Autódromo José Carlos Pace, São Paulo
(21)	21-November	6am	AUSTRALIA	Albert Park Circuit, Melbourne
(22)	05-December	4pm	SAUDI ARABIA	Jeddah Street Circuit, Saudi Arabia
(23)	12-December	1pm	ABU DHABI	Yas Marina Circuit, Abu Dhabi

🏁

Champion Hamilton chases down Schumacher record

F1 2020 TEAM LINE-UP		www.formula1.com	Age	GPs	Pole	Wins	Titles
Alfa Romeo Racing- Ferrari	(7) (99)	Kimi Räikkönen (FIN) Antonio Giovinazzi (ITA)	40 26	312 23	18 -	21 -	1 -
AlphaTauri-Honda	(10) (26)	Pierre Gasly (FRA) Daniil Kvyat (RUS)	24 26	47 93	- -	- -	- -
Ferrari	(5) (16)	Sebastian Vettel (GER) Charles Leclerc (MON)	33 22	240 42	57 7	53 2	4 -
Haas-Ferrari	(8) (20)	Romain Grosjean (FRA) Kevin Magnussen (DEN)	34 27	164 102	- -	- -	- -
McLaren-Renault	(4) (55)	Lando Norris (GBR) Carlos Sainz Jr (ESP)	20 25	21 102	- -	- -	- -
Mercedes	(44) (77)	Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Valtteri Bottas (FIN)	35 30	250 139	88 11	84 7	6 -
Racing Point-BWT Mercedes	(11) (18)	Sergio Pérez (MEX) Lance Stroll (CAN)	30 21	176 62	- -	- -	- -
Red Bull Racing-Honda	(23) (33)	Alexander Albon (THA) Max Verstappen (NED)	24 22	21 102	- 2	- 8	- -
Renault	(3) (31)	Daniel Ricciardo (AUS) Esteban Ocon (FRA)	31 23	171 50	3 -	7 -	- -
Williams-Mercedes	(6) (63)	Nicholas Latifi (CAN) George Russell (GBR)	25 22	0 21	- -	- -	- -

SIX-TIME champion Lewis Hamilton had to settle for second place in qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix as the 2020 Formula One season finally got under way.

Hamilton was surprisingly beaten by Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas - but will nevertheless be pleased by his team's dominance over closest rivals Red Bull this afternoon.

Max Verstappen has won the Austrian Grand Prix in both of the last two years - so was no doubt hopeful of a quick start to the Championship with both of the opening races being held in Spielberg. 

However, Dutchman Verstappen could only qualify third - and was split from his team-mate Alexander Albon, though they at least start on the clean start of the track. 

Instead, McLaren youngster Lando Norris took a career-best fourth place on the grid with a phenomenal lap in a session which will have provided much hope to the Woking-based outfit.

By contrast, Ferrari suffered from a tiresomely familiar early-season story of failure. 

It is now 12 years since the proud Prancing Horse team were Constructors champions and 13 years since the Drivers' title made its way to Maranello.

And things do not look like improving any time soon.

Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel struggled badly with his set-up and could not even make it into the final round of qualifying. 

Meanwhile, Vettel's young Monégasque team-mate Charles Leclerc recovered from scraping 10th place in the second session to a grid placing of seventh.

That outcome carried on a trend from last season when, despite starting the year as Ferrari's designated number one, Vettel was beaten on every measure by the 22-year-old.

It would be fair to say that Vettel's well-publicised difficulties at Ferrari have already been badly exposed on this opening weekend.

Indeed, at this stage, it is difficult to envisage the 33-year-old German staying until the end of the season with a non-competitive Ferrari team, having been told his services will not be required for 2021.

The shake-up in next year's driver line-up sees Carlos Sainz Jr move to Ferrari with Australian Daniel Ricciardo heading from Renault to the vacant McLaren seat.

Mercedes have Hamilton of course, while Red Bull have retained Verstappen - and surely neither team would take on the troublesome Vettel as a second driver.

The German, therefore, appears to have nowhere to go in 2021 - and the early signs from this season are that he will depart F1 with a whimper rather than a bang.

Instead, it is Hamilton who - having won the Drivers' Championship for five of the last six years - remains the undisputed king of the race-track.

Indeed, there is an air of inevitability that the 35-year-old from Stevenage will win a record-equalling seventh Drivers' title this year and climb to the summit alongside Michael Schumacher. 

But, even if Hamilton blows all of his rivals out of the water as usual, there is still plenty for F1 fans to get their teeth into. 

The midfield battle - behind the big three of Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari - has been given an extra element of intrigue by the so-called Pink Mercedes of Racing Point.

Having based the design of the RP20 around that of last year’s title winner, strong pre-season testing and practice runs have raised hopes of Sergio Perez and Lance Stroll challenging for podium finishes.

But, while Perez and Stroll qualified in highly respectable positions of sixth and ninth, it was undoubtedly Norris who deserved the early plaudits for steering his McLaren onto the second row.

Elsewhere, the back-markers look set to be Haas, Alfa Romeo and - somewhat depressingly - Williams, with the cars from those three teams filling each of the bottom six places in qualifying in Austria.

Certainly, it seems a long time ago since Williams' halcyon days of the 1980s and 1990s when they dominated the sport with seven Drivers' championships and nine Constructors' championships in an 18-year period. 

By contrast, recent times have been pretty grim for the Grove-based team, with last-placed finishes in both of the last two years matched by off-track financial worries. 

In May, Williams announced they were seeking buyers for a portion of the team and that they had terminated the contract of title sponsor ROKiT.

But the coronavirus pandemic makes this an even more difficult time than usual to look for investment - and so a future for Williams beyond 2020 remains troublingly uncertain.

CALENDAR
July
 5 Austrian GP ▪️ Red Bull Ring, Spielberg
12 Styrian GP ▪️ Red Bull Ring, Spielberg
19 Hungarian GP ▪️ Hungaroring, Mogyoród
August
2 British GP ▪️ Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone
9 70th Anniversary GP ▪️ Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone
16 Spanish GP ▪️ Circuit de Catalunya, Barcelona
30 Belgian GP ▪️ Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps
September 
6 Italian GP ▪️ Autodromo Nazionale di Monza

Match postponed

TOP-LEVEL football in the UK will not return until 30 April at the earliest as the coronavirus pandemic continued to cause carnage to the sporting calendar this week.

All games in the Premier League and the Football League, and all fixtures in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, are currently postponed.

However, at the same meeting on Thursday, the Football Association agreed that the current season can be "extended indefinitely".

Liverpool fans - having seen their team build up a 25-point advantage in their search for a first league title for 30 years - can rest a little easier perhaps.

Earlier, on Tuesday, Euro 2020 was postponed by UEFA until the summer of 2021.

UEFA President Aleksander Čeferin announced the delay of exactly 12 months to avoid "placing any unnecessary pressure on national public services" in its 12 host countries.

Sensibly, the postponement will also provide a chance for European leagues that have been suspended to be completed when action eventually resumes.

For now, though, it is unclear when exactly that will be.

Only last week, the Premier League and the Football League suspended their respective programmes of fixtures until 4 April, after confirmed positive results for Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta and Chelsea midfielder Callum Hudson-Odoi.

But the exponential increase in cases in the UK has already caused this further four-week delay to the resumption of the action.

The latest figures released by the Department of Health and Social Care show there have now been 3,983 positive cases of COVID-19 in the UK and 177 deaths from the virus.

Meanwhile, in terms of the numbers on a worldwide basis, there have been over 11,000 deaths from more than 270,000 positive cases.

In terms of declared fatalities, Italy - with 4,032 deaths - has now overtaken China (3,248 deaths), the place from which the strain is thought to have originated.

Back here in the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson held a press conference on Monday in which he advised that everyone in the UK should avoid "non-essential" travel and contact with others.

Mass gatherings in places such as bars, restaurants, theatres and sports arenas should be avoided, he added - and, yesterday, these venues were ordered to close their doors completely.

Of course, much of the sporting world had already taken matters into their own hands - and the presence of the Italians in the Six Nations meant it was unavoidably among the first competitions to be affected.

At first, only matches involving the Azzurri against Ireland on 7 March and England on 14 March were postponed - but eventually all three of the games in the final round fell victim to the virus.

Elsewhere, the England cricket tour of Sri Lanka was abruptly ended midway through a warm-up match with captain Joe Root admitting to "an element of relief" that the decision had been made to bring the squad back home.

In the meantime, the season in Formula One has not yet even got off the start line.

The Chinese Grand Prix was postponed as far back as February - but it took until the very eve of the season opener in Australia for the race at Albert Park in Melbourne to be called off.

Even then, it was only hastily announced by motorsport governing body the FIA after McLaren had withdrawn from the Grand Prix following the return of a positive result for a team member's coronavirus test.

Delays to the races in Bahrain and Vietnam were also confirmed last week.

However, just this week, the Dutch and Spanish Grand Prix have also now been postponed - and the blue-ribbon event in Monaco has been cancelled completely.

Nevertheless, an already-congested calendar could still be bursting at the seams when - or, maybe at this stage, if - the campaign eventually gets going.

Eight Grand Prix need to be completed in order to constitute a Formula One season.

Unsurprisingly, the worldwide tennis and golf tours have been suspended with the French Open tennis at Rolland Garros moved, merely in hope at this stage, to the autumn.

And, although the Cheltenham Festival was somehow completed last week, the big Grand National meeting at Aintree at the start of April is off.

In terms of individual sports, snooker perhaps took longest to react to the developing crisis - and the Gibraltar Open still took place last week behind closed doors.

Yesterday, however, World Snooker bowed to the inevitable and announced a delay to Judd Trump's world title defence at the Crucible until July at the earliest.

Rather remarkably, the Tokyo-based 2020 Summer Olympics are still scheduled, for now, to go ahead from 24 July until 9 August.

"We will overcome the spread of the infection and host the Olympics without problem, as planned," Japanese PM Shinzo Abe said.

But, while the situation in Asia may have stabilised and even improved, Abe appears to be totally deluded if he thinks Tokyo 2020 will simply proceed without a hitch.

The Japanese reluctance to cancel or even merely delay the Games is understandable considering their outlay of around 1.35 trillion yen (£10.26bn).

Nevertheless, it is currently impossible to envisage anything except for the Olympics being added to the great sporting scrapheap of 2020.

Now, of course, football and sport carry no particular importance while the whole of the human race fronts up to a virulent pandemic. 

Legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly was sadly misguided when he famously declared that football was more important than life and death.

But, another great football man - former Italy and AC Milan head coach Arrigo Sacchi - was spot on with his assessment when he said: "Football is the most important of the least important things."

At the moment, it is much missed along with the other sporting events which allow otherwise inconsequential weeks to trundle into months, and months into years.

Worryingly, though, coronavirus is not going away any time soon - and, as the peak rapidly approaches, it is going to get worse far sooner than it gets better.

Stay safe, keep well everyone, and remember to wash your hands regularly.

F1 2015 preview: Advantage Hamilton in dominant Mercedes

FORMULA ONE 2015

MERCEDES + RED BULL + WILLIAMS + FERRARI + MCLAREN + FORCE INDIA + TORO ROSSO + LOTUS + MANOR MARUSSIA + SAUBER

MERCEDES 

	F1 W06 Hybrid	GPs	Pole	Wins
44	Lewis HAMILTON (Gbr)	148	38	33 (2 championships)
6	Nico ROBSERG (Ger)	166	15	8

Dominant Mercedes remain well clear of the field which can only be good news for defending champion Lewis Hamilton. The Briton won his second world title in November, six years after his first, and this season is a wonderful opportunity for him to ensure he does not have to wait quite as long between championships again. 
A third crown for Hamilton would put him level with his idol, the late Ayrton Senna - and, having seen off team-mate Nico Rosberg with a brilliant surge of form in the second of last season, the biggest danger to the Stevenage-born champ might just be himself.
After all, Hamilton's off-season has once again been dominated by stories about his personal life, most notably his split with his management team, Simon Fuller’s XIX Entertainment, and his latest break-up with pop-star Nicole Scherzinger. The last time Hamilton had the potential to be so distracted by external events, in 2011, he suffered his worst season in F1 - and, while the Englishman insists he is a lot more mature now, the door is open for Rosberg to exert pressure. 
Certainly, it feels as if the German needs a good start this year to heal the wounds of giving up such a strong position in the autumn of last year. Indeed, Rosberg's early-season form will surely determine just how competitive the Drivers' Championship actually is.  

RED BULL-RENAULT

	RB11	GPs	Pole	Wins
3	Daniel RICCIARDO (Aus)	69	0	3
26	Daniil KVYAT (Rus)	19	0	0

Coming just a year after joining the team as Sebastian Vettel's second-in-command, Australian Daniel Ricciardo is now the undoubted number one driver at Red Bull Racing. It is a fully merited position for the way Ricciardo thoroughly out-raced four-time world champion Vettel with the German consequently seeking refuge at Ferrari, one year short of completing his contract.
Joining Ricciardo instead is highly-rated 20-year-old Russian Daniil Kvyat who impressed so much in his rookie season with sister team Toro Rosso that he got the big call from Christian Horner. Now, of course, Ricciardo is the hunted, more experienced driver - but, while Vettel seemed quick to find faults when things were not going his way, the Aussie's laid-back personality should stand him in good stead for another season in which any Grand Prix wins will again come against the odds. For Kvyat, the move might have come a little too early - though you never quite know and his record against Ricciardo will provide a source of early-season fascination. 

WILLIAMS-MERCEDES 

	FW37	GPs	Pole	Wins
19	Felipe MASSA (Brz)	212	16	11
77	Valtteri BOTTAS (Fin)	38	0	0

Williams enjoyed their finest season for many a year in the last campaign, deservedly taking third place in the Constructors' Championship ahead of Ferrari and McLaren. 
The Grove-based team finished on a particular high as Felipe Massa - seventh in the Drivers' standings - and Valtteri Bottas - fourth - gave the team a first double podium since Nick Heidfeld and Mark Webber finished second and third at Monaco in 2005. As a result, it was no surprise to see this talented partnership retained for 2015.
But one thing that will irk Bottas in particular, given his six podium finishes last season, was the lack of a Grand Prix victory - and so Williams might even be prepared to accept a greater level of inconsistency if their points total happened to feature a first race win since Pastor Maldonado's rather random success in 2012, and only a second since 2004.

FERRARI 

	SF15-T	GPs	Pole	Wins
5	Sebastian VETTEL (Ger)	139	45	39 (4 championships)
7	Kimi RAIKKONEN (Fin)	213	16	20 (1 championship)

Flailing Ferrari have brought four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel on board in a bid to restore former glories - but, despite his quadruple between 2010 and 2013, the German himself also needs to fix his reputation somewhat. After all, Vettel only joined the Italian giants for the 2015 season having been shocked to find Daniel Ricciardo not to be quite as acquiescent a team-mate as fellow Australian Mark Webber.
At least Vettel should have the beating of his new team-mate Kimi Raikkonen if last year is anything to go by. The Finn's best moments came from his often amusing radio communication with the team as, on the track, he totally failed to live anywhere near up to a reputation mainly built on him being a former Ferrari world champion in his first spell at Maranello.
In fairness to Ferrari, testing has gone better than expected and there has been some much-needed change at the top of the organisation. New president Sergio Marchionne has brought in a new team principal - with Maurizio Arrivabene arriving to replace the sacked Marco Mattiacci. Nevertheless, the team's ambitions are as modest as they ever have been - and the stated target of two race wins hardly inspiring stuff for the Tifosi.

MCLAREN-HONDA 

	MP4-30	GPs	Pole	Wins
14	Fernando ALONSO (Esp)	236	22	32 (2 championships)
22	Jenson BUTTON (Gbr)	268	8	15 (1 championship)
20	Kevin MAGNUSSEN (Den)	19	0	0

Off the pace until at least May, it would be fair to say that last season's woes for McLaren have continued into this year despite (or perhaps because of) a change in engine supplier to Honda. 
Stalwart Jenson Button has even admitted the Woking outfit could be right at the back of the grid for this weekend's season opener in Melbourne if struggling new boys Manor Marussia do not run. Such an outcome would be a shame for the Frome flyer, a well-liked character and the most experienced driver in the paddock, who only just saved his seat in the sport before Christmas after some last ditch negotiating.
Eventually, once McLaren get going, the Briton will be joined by Spaniard Fernando Alonso following his surprise move to reacquaint himself with a team he left under a cloud in 2007. His second debut will not happen just yet, though, as Alonso has been ruled out of the Australian Grand Prix following a high-speed collision in testing. It actually turned into a rather odd incident with conflicting reports over the extent of the injury and, even now, there remain a few unanswered questions.
Genuine mystery also surrounds the reason behind Alonso's return to McLaren, described rather cynically in some quarters as a marriage of convenience. After all, even if the two-time world champion had become frustrated with so regularly outperforming Ferrari, he has effectively swapped one team struggling to live up to its glorious reputation for another currently doing even worse. Alonso and McLaren is definitely a relationship worth watching.

FORCE INDIA-MERCEDES 

	VJM08	GPs	Pole	Wins
11	Sergio PEREZ (Mex)	77	0	0
27	Nico HULKENBERG (Ger)	77	1	0

Moored in mid-table since 2008, it is difficult to know what Force India can do to improve their fortunes. They have the strongest engine in Mercedes and a decent driver line-up has been retained - but, while they challenged McLaren for fifth throughout the whole of 2014, two double retirements in Hungary and United States ultimately left the Silverstone-based outfit in sixth place for the third time in four years.
Yet more ups and downs can be expected in the next eight-and-a-half months with the best efforts of Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg restricted by an increasingly parlous financial situation. Perez, in particular, is capable of a searing lap which can propel him up the grid, while Hulkenberg was a consistent points scorer throughout the whole of the last campaign, missing out only on four occasions.  

TORO ROSSO-RENAULT 

	STR10	GPs	Pole	Wins
33	Max VERSTAPPEN (Net)	0	0	0
55	Carlos SAINZ Jr (Esp)	0	0	0

Red Bull's sister team Toro Rosso have taken their much-vaunted youth policy to extremes this winter with 17-year-old Dutchman Max Verstappen hitting the headlines after becoming the youngest ever Formula One driver. Undoubtedly talented, Verstappen won six successive races in the Formula Three championship on his way to finishing third in the series overall last season.
But, frankly, Formula One is another level of pressure again - and, as BBC writer Andrew Benson points out, the Red Bull talent stream is a cut-throat business with many decent drivers failing to make the grade. Nevertheless, others - such as Sebastian Vettel, Daniel Ricciardo and, most recently, Daniil Kvyat - have thrived, and Verstappen will be determined to add his name to that still-fledgling list. 
Verstappen's team-mate, Carlos Sainz Jr, was initially overlooked in the Dutchman's favour - and only won a seat when Kvyat was promoted to the main Red Bull team. Such an occurrence was hardly a vote of confidence in the Spaniard who - while being only 20 years old himself - could do with some strong early performances to quieten the hype surrounding his teenage colleague.

LOTUS-MERCEDES 

	E23 Hybrid	GPs	Pole	Wins
8	Romain GROSJEAN (Fra)	64	0	0
13	Pastor MALDONADO (Ven)	77	1	1

Having dropped back from fourth place in the Constructors' Championship in 2012 and 2013 to eighth last year, Lotus should return to a more competitive mid-table placing this time following their switch to Mercedes engines.
It could perhaps be higher than mid-table - but such a result would rely on the most crash-happy pair in F1 cleaning up their act. Actually, that is perhaps not too fair on Romain Grosjean who got much better at keeping his nose out of trouble, especially in the second half of last season. 
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about team-mate Pastor Maldonado who even has a website dedicated to his scrapes. Indeed, in many ways, it was quite refreshing to hear that the Venezuelan had crashed out of the final pre-season test at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona. Clearly, the start of the new season was not far away.

MANOR MARUSSIA-FERRARI 

	MR03	GPs	Pole	Wins
28	Will STEVENS (Gbr)	1	0	0
98	Roberto MERHI (Esp)	0	0	0

The fact that the Marussia name lives on at all in Formula One is a testament to the efforts of everyone at Manor Motorsport and others who were not prepared to allow the team to die without a fight. Considering they were only cleared to race earlier this week, doubts remain over whether the two cars will actually make it on the grid in Melbourne.
Moreover, when they do finally compete, it would be amazing if they were not anything but dead last - at least, though, they have made it this far. A baptism of fire awaits Essex lad Will Stevens and his Spanish team-mate Roberto Merhi but the rookies will hopefully be able to gain something out of the experience. If nothing else, the pair will have nothing to lose with Merhi also only actually announced as racing for the team earlier this week.

SAUBER-FERRARI   

	C34	GPs	Pole	Wins
9	Marcus ERICSSON (Swe)	16	0	0
12	Felipe NASR (Brz)	0	0	0

It went right to the wire - but, at the 11th hour, former Caterham driver Giedo van der Garde agreed to drop his legal action against Sauber. All the way through the saga, it had looked as if the opposite might be the case especially after judgements this week from the Victoria Supreme Court in Australia and an appeals hearing found the Dutchman had a case when he said he had been promised a seat at Sauber for 2015.
Nevertheless, van der Garde's decision to move on belatedly gives the team he nearly joined a chance to get on with what is an important campaign. Coming off the back of a dreadful 2014, which saw the Swiss outfit finish with nul points for the first time ever, 2015 can surely only be an improvement.
Coincidentally another former Caterham driver, Marcus Ericsson, and rookie Felipe Nasr have been given the task of restoring Sauber to a place of mid-table respectability. But, even without any further distractions from van der Garde, it looks a tough ask.

2015 RACE CALENDAR
Sky will broadcast all 20 races live on its dedicated channel (Sky 407). Where Sky is listed in the column below, the satellite channel has exclusively live coverage and the BBC will only show extended (delayed) highlights. The BBC has live coverage of 10 races where its name is listed below, notably omitting Monaco in May.

Date	TV		Pole position	Fastest lap	Winner
15 March	Sky	Australian Grand Prix
29 March	BBC	Malaysian Grand Prix
12 April	Sky	Chinese Grand Prix
19 April	BBC	Bahrain Grand Prix
10 May	Sky	Spanish Grand Prix
24 May	Sky	Monaco Grand Prix
7 June	BBC	Canadian Grand Prix
21 June	Sky	Austrian Grand Prix
5 July	BBC	British Grand Prix
19 July	Sky	German Grand Prix
26 July	BBC	Hungarian Grand Prix
23 August	BBC	Belgian Grand Prix
6 September	Sky	Italian Grand Prix
20 September	Sky	Singapore Grand Prix
27 September	BBC	Japanese Grand Prix
11 October	BBC	Russian Grand Prix
25 October	Sky	United States Grand Prix
1 November	Sky	Mexican Grand Prix
15 November	BBC	Brazilian Grand Prix
29 November	BBC	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

F1 2014 review: Magnificent Mercedes find no equal

MERCEDES - 701 points

01	Lewis Hamilton (Gbr)	Mercedes	384 (11 wins)
02	Nico Rosberg (Ger)	Mercedes	317 (5 wins)

Clearly having developed the best car on the grid by a distance following a regulations overhaul, Mercedes pair Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg quickly realised the title battle was between themselves.
And what a battle it proved to be - with the prediction of more to come after Monaco one of the easiest to make all year. After all, when there is a world championship on the line, even long-standing friendships will feel the strain and there were various flashpoints across the season.
In Monte Carlo, Hamilton felt Rosberg had denied him the chance to his improve on his best time in qualifying after parking up in Mirabeau. On a street circuit where it is notoriously difficult to overtake, Hamilton duly finished the race in second to his German team-mate.
In Hungary, Hamilton got revenge of sorts - refusing a team order to let Rosberg through - but, by the time the Belgian Grand Prix in Spa had finished later in the summer, Rosberg held a 29-point advantage, with Hamilton having been forced to retire as a result of a clash between the pair.
Then Rosberg seemed to crack - a rudimentary mistake at a chicane in Monza gifted Hamilton the Italian Grand Prix and, thereafter, the Briton stepped it up, winning five consecutive races to stretch his lead from Singapore onwards. Double points at Abu Dhabi kept Rosberg's hopes alive - but, as a result of Hamilton's great start and Rosberg's subsequent mechanical problems the much-anticipated Duel in the Desert never materialised. 

RED BULL-RENAULT - 405 points

03	Daniel Ricciardo (Aus)	Red Bull-Renault	238 (3 wins)
05	Sebastian Vettel (Ger)	Red Bull-Renault	167

So, Red Bull's RB10 was perhaps not as bad a car as it was made out to be in pre-season. Certainly, the ever-smiling Australian Daniel Ricciardo thought so - as he made good on move up the grid from sister team Toro Rosso in being the only driver not in a Mercedes to win a Grand Prix.
Not only that, he did it three times - in Canada, where he overtook an ailing Rosberg with two laps to go, and then in Hungary and Belgium where he took advantage of Mercedes infighting. Yes, there was perhaps an element of fortune to each of his wins - but five third-place finishes and regular scoring across the season ensured Ricciardo comfortably finished the best of the rest.
Sadly, the same could not be said of defending champion Sebastian Vettel after a difficult season which featured only four podium visits, with none of them coming on the top step. Beaten 12-7 in qualifying by his less experienced team-mate, the four-time champion cut a frustrated figure and, one year short of the end of his contract, ended up moving to Ferrari. An eighth-placed finish at Abu Dhabi was hardly a vintage way to go out from a team in which he had enjoyed record-breaking success - but anything else would have been atypical of his season. 

WILLIAMS-MERCEDES - 320 points

04	Valtteri Bottas (Fin)	Williams-Mercedes	186
07	Felipe Massa (Brz)	Williams-Mercedes	134

Williams-Mercedes enjoyed their best season in years - and appropriately finished on a high with the double podium in Abu Dhabi being their first since Nick Heidfeld and Mark Webber finished second and third at Monaco in 2005.
Of course, the Mercedes engines helped - but, in Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa, the Grove-based outfit also benefited from two highly-motivated drivers. For Bottas, the motivation presumably stemmed from the fact that he is only in his second season as an F1 driver - and yet, despite his relative inexperience, the Finn has already shown a lot desire to succeed. A mid-season run of four podium finishes out of five between the Grand Prix in Austria and Belgium was the highlight of a campaign in which he regularly carried most threat to the Mercedes pair.
For Massa, meanwhile, the move to Williams was meant to be a liberation from playing second fiddle to Fernando Alonso. Sadly, it did not quite work out like that - and Bottas out-qualified his Brazilian team-mate by 13-6. Nevertheless, Massa also suffered some dreadful luck on race day, being crashed into through no fault of his own on more than one occasion. Thankfully, the second half of the season proved more fruitful than with a second-placed finish in Abu Dhabi and third-placed finishes in Italy and, emotionally, at his home Grand Prix in Brazil.

FERRARI - 216 points

06	Fernando Alonso (Spa)	Ferrari	161
12	Kimi Räikkönen (Fin)	Ferrari	55

Ferrari got it all wrong yet again with the F14 T, producing another bang-average car. Nevertheless, it was the difference in attitude between two former world champions Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen which was more startling.
Alonso has long been the standard-bearer for the Italian giants and, once again this season, strived to do as well as he could in an almost impossible position. Visits to the podium in China and Hungary were phenomenal drives - and, altogether, the Spaniard still recorded 14 top-six finishes to earn sixth place in the overall standings. Ninth at Abu Dhabi is not how Alonso would have wanted to go out - but it really comes as no surprise that, after years of title-less trying, he has moved to pastures new.
Räikkönen, by contrast, has been retained despite being out-qualified by Alonso by 16-3 and driving around as if he has already taken an early retirement. Generally saving his best moments for his often hilarious communication with his team over the radio, his fourth place in Spa was a complete an anomaly in terms of his performance on the track. For, while he retired just once all season, in Silverstone, the Flying Finn finished outside of the points on no fewer than five occasions. 

MCLAREN-MERCEDES - 181 points

08	Jenson Button (Gbr)	McLaren-Mercedes	126
11	*Kevin Magnussen (Den)	McLaren-Mercedes	55

Oh dear. There can be few false dawns as bright as the one McLaren produced at the Australian Grand Prix eight months ago. 
With the disqualification of Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo, Danish debutant Kevin Magnussen was deemed to have finished second - the best finish by a rookie on debut since Jacques Villeneuve in 1996. Meanwhile, Jenson Button was also promoted to the podium in third - and, ever so briefly, it looked as if the Woking-based team might be the one likely to provide the closest challenge to the dominant Mercedes.
In the long run, though, the MP4-29 proved no better than the MP4-28 as McLaren chalked up consecutive fifth-placed finishes on what could sadly be Button's swansong. Yet, despite the doubts over his position for next year, the Frome flyer was absolutely key even to them achieving this modest target as he earned himself a creditable eighth place in the overall standings having had 12 other points finishes after Melbourne.
Indeed, the Briton's form in the last couple of months - two fourth places and two fifth in the last five races - was good enough to lift McLaren above Force India in an unexpected mid-table tussle. And, as he admitted himself, the fifth in Abu Dhabi was pretty much as good as it was going to get.
For Magnussen, the season unsurprisingly got no better than the second place in Australia as he finished with less than half the points of his vastly more experienced team-mate. Nevertheless, among the usual rookie errors, there were flashes of talent. He matched Button in qualifying - and secured a fifth-placed finish in Russia among his 12 points-based finishes altogether.

FORCE INDIA-MERCEDES - 155 points

09	Nico Hulkenberg (Ger)	Force India-Mercedes	96
10	Sergio Pérez (Mex)	Force India-Mercedes	59

Force India will keep faith in Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Pérez after both drivers scored consistently enough across the season to keep this solidly mid-table team solidly in mid-table. In fact, this is the third season in the last four that Force India have finished sixth in the Constructors' Championship - and, even then, the exceptional year was a seventh-placed finish.
Referring solely to 2014, the undoubted highlight was Pérez's podium visit in Bahrain - only the team's second ever top-three finish - but, in the final reckoning, it was actually team-mate Hulkenberg who could boast the better overall stats.
The German finished the season with more points, more points finishes, and a qualifying record which was 12-7 in his favour. Indeed, he started the season with 10 consecutive points finishes and only missed out on four occasions, twice through retirement.
Ultimately, thanks mainly to Jenson Button's late-season form for McLaren, the efforts of Hulkenberg, in particular, and Pérez were not quite good enough to cause a surprise and break Force India into that top five. But they were not too far away either - and, in fact, held the position above McLaren as late as mid-October.

TORO ROSSO-RENAULT - 30 points

13	Jean-Eric Vergne (Fra)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	22
15	*Daniil Kyvat (Rus)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	8

Russian rookie Daniil Kyvat provided some early-season excitement by finishing in the points positions in three of the opening four Grand Prix - but, in the end, it was his slightly more experienced team-mate Jean-Eric Vergne who picked up more points across the season. 
For, while Kyvat would only feature in the top 10 twice more from the Spanish Grand Prix onwards, Vergne enjoyed seven points-based finishes across the campaign including a sixth place under the lights in Singapore.
Still, perhaps as a result of him out-qualifying Vergne by 12-7, Kyvat has ended up being the ultimate victor in this tussle, the Russian having been fast-tracked to support Daniel Ricciardo at Toro Rosso's big brother Red Bull. Vergne today announced he will no longer race for Toro Rosso so it remains to be seen who will partner 17-year-old rookie Max Verstappen next year.

LOTUS-RENAULT - 10 points

14	Romain Grosjean (Fra)	Lotus-Renault	8
16	Pastor Maldonado (Ven)	Lotus-Renault	2

For Lotus, who finished fourth in the Constructors' Championship in 2013, the season had gone into a stall before it had even properly begun. In pre-season testing, their car ran fewer laps than any other - and at the opening race in Australia, it showed. 
Both cars qualified behind Marussia and Caterham with Pastor Maldonado not even able to set a time and Romain Grosjean was then forced to start from the pit-lane due to making car modifications under parc ferme conditions. Finally, in the race itself, the two cars retired within a lap of one another with the same power unit problem.
It did get slightly better - Grosjean finished eighth in consecutive races in Spain and Monaco, while crash-happy Maldonado eventually stayed out of trouble at antepenultimate race in the United States to finish ninth. But these were the only points finishes of the season - and, with cash-strapped Lotus retaining the same driver line-up for 2015, all hope is being pinned on the acquisition of a Mercedes engine. 

MARUSSIA-FERRARI - 2 points

17	Jules Bianchi (Fra)	Marussia-Ferrari	2
21	Max Chilton (Gbr)	Marussia-Ferrari	0

From glory to despair via still possibly tragic circumstances, Marussia have endured a bizarrely notorious season for a back-marker, failing to make it to end before going out of business. 
The highlight came at Monaco where Frenchman Jules Bianchi finished ninth to earn the team their first ever points at their 83rd attempt and his 25th. It was a deserved outcome for Bianchi who had regularly finished further up the classification than he ought to - his future looked bright, even if the same could not be said of Marussia.
Then, in Japan, in extremely wet conditions, Bianchi suffered a horrific crash head-first into a crane rescuing the stricken Sauber of Adrian Sutil. It was a reminder of just how dangerous Formula One can be, even with the great advances in safety since the death of Ayrton Senna 20 years ago. Yet, as the paddock admirably rallied together, the Bianchi accident also demonstrated just how much this sport means to the drivers that they willingly continue to subject themselves to such possible outcomes. Bianchi remains unconscious and in a critical condition - and, for what little it is worth, this report still hopes for the best.
Team-mate Max Chilton only competed in one more race, retiring from the Russian Grand Prix on lap nine with a suspension problem. It was a rare retirement for the Briton - but, having been out-qualified 12-3 by Bianchi, the youngster from Reigate has just as rarely shown the raw pace of his team-mate. The demise of Marussia leaves him without a seat in 2015.

SAUBER-FERRARI - 0 points

18	Adrian Sutil (Ger)	Sauber-Ferrari	0
20	Esteban Gutiérrez (Mex)	Sauber-Ferrari	0

Sauber-Ferrari suffered their worst ever season in 22 years of involvement in Formula One, failing to score across a whole campaign for the first time ever. 
Kept off the bottom only thanks to Adrian Sutil's two 11th-placed finishes in Australia and Hungary, this was as good as it got for a usually solidly mid-table team.
Mexican team-mate Esteban Gutiérrez could only manage a best of 13th - once at Suzuka in Japan - and so it is no surprise to see Swiss owner Peter Sauber bring in a whole new line-up for 2015 with former Caterham driver Marcus Ericsson being joined by Brazilian rookie Felipe Nasr.

CATERHAM-RENAULT - 0 points

19	*Marcus Ericsson (Swe)	Caterham-Renault	0
22	Kamui Kobayashi (Jpn)	Caterham-Renault	0
23	*Will Stevens (Gbr)	Caterham-Renault	0

Caterham-Renault were the only team to use more than two drivers across the season - and, just as none of their choices scored any points at all, the whole team effectively stumbled over the finish line in Abu Dhabi.
Forced into administration after the Russian Grand Prix with the loss of 230 jobs, Caterham missed two Grand Prix altogether in United States and Brazil. They then only made it to the season-closer in the United Arab Emirates thanks to an effective crowd-sourcing campaign.
For the record, Caterham's best finish was 11th from Swedish rookie Marcus Ericsson in Monaco while Japanese driver Kamui Kobayashi managed two 13th-placed finishes in Malaysia and Monaco again.
British youngster Will Stevens was 17th and last to finish on his Grand Prix debut in Abu Dhabi (replacing Ericsson) - but now the hard work for Caterham really begins as they seek some secure backing to salvage their position on the grid.

FORMULA ONE 2014 REPORTS
14.03 Season preview: Ripe for renewal
29.05 More to come from Mercedes pair
07.07 Hamilton shines at Silverstone
22.09 Hamilton leads the way under the Singapore lights
24.11 Hamilton reaches another level

F1 2014: Hamilton shines at Silverstone

LEWIS HAMILTON won an entertaining British Grand Prix at Silverstone to close the gap on Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg to four points in the title race.

The big action at the Northamptonshire circuit started almost immediately with a first Formula One red flag in 14 years on an opening lap after former world champion Kimi Räikkönen crashed into a barrier.

Räikkönen, rejoining the race having gone wide at Aintree corner, span wildly off the grass and right across the track, catching the unlucky Felipe Massa on the way.

And there then followed a delay of an hour as the damaged guardrail was hastily repaired.

For the record, Räikkönen himself has suffered bruised ankles from the 150mph shunt and is a doubt for the German Grand Prix in two weeks.

But the lack of series injuries suffered to him or any of the other drivers is once again testament to the fine progress made over the years by the authorities to make the sport much safer.

Once the action resumed, so did the title fight, as Hamilton - who qualified a disappointing sixth - swiftly passed McLaren pair Kevin Magnussen and Jenson Button to move behind leader Rosberg.

Not for the first time this season, the 2008 world champion then lost time to his German team-mate in the pits - but fortune finally favoured the Briton on lap 29 when Rosberg retired with a gearbox problem.

It was Rosberg's first retirement of 2014 - in fact, his first for 25 races - and it denied the capacity Silverstone crowd what looked set to be a fascinating head-to-head.

Nevertheless, Hamilton's dominant position earned him big cheers from most of the 120,000 spectators, and there was still plenty of exciting action to follow from the stands.

Williams' Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas provided much of it, moving up from 14th on the grid to a career-best second place.

Meanwhile Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo also finished on the podium and thus continues to outperform his more decorated team-mate, four-time defending champ Sebastian Vettel.

Fourth place went to Button, an encouraging result for the 34-year-old Frome flyer in his previously struggling McLaren. It did mean, though, that he missed out on a podium at Silverstone for the 15th time.

Vettel, on fresher tyres, beat Ferrari's Fernando Alonso to fifth after a great tussle throughout the latter stages of the race, which provided the true definition of wheel-to-wheel racing. It really was first class stuff.

The other points positions went to Magnussen in seventh, Nico Hulkenberg in eighth, Russian youngster Daniil Kyvat in ninth, and Jean-Eric Vergne in 10th.

The title race, then, remains a two-horse race with Rosberg (165points) narrowly ahead of Hamilton (161), and Ricciardo (98) placed as the best of the rest.

Alonso is fourth on 87 points ahead of the impressive Bottas (73), who moved ahead of Vettel this weekend.

A hugely important weekend, it has been too - with Hamilton able to put behind his recent disappointments to get back in the thick of the title battle.

It also provided some Great British cheer after a pretty miserable sporting summer so far. England's footballers, of course, flopped out of the first round of the World Cup and the rugby union side were whitewashed by the All Blacks in New Zealand.

The cricketers were shocked at home by Sri Lanka, and this week Andy Murray provided a limp defence of his hard-earned Wimbledon crown.

Even the first stage of the Tour de France this weekend had brought bad news as Manxman Mark Cavendish crashed out of the whole race in the closing sprint.

But, as unlikely as it seemed on Sunday morning, Hamilton has restored a smile to the face of British sport - for now.

And, as Hamilton freely admits himself, he is ready to go into "attack mode".

Particularly sweet would be if he could follow up this win with another in the next Grand Prix. It is held in Hockenheim - Rosberg's home circuit - on 20 July.

FORMULA ONE 2014

Date	TV		Pole position	Fastest lap	Winner
16 March	Sky	Australian Grand Prix	Hamilton	Rosberg	Rosberg
30 March	BBC	Malaysian Grand Prix	Hamilton	Hamilton	Hamilton
6 April	Sky	Bahrain Grand Prix	Rosberg	Rosberg	Hamilton
20 April	Sky	Chinese Grand Prix	Hamilton	Rosberg	Hamilton
11 May	BBC	Spanish Grand Prix	Hamilton	Vettel	Hamilton
25 May	Sky	Monaco Grand Prix	Rosberg	Räikkönen	Rosberg
8 June	BBC	Canadian Grand Prix	Rosberg	Massa	Ricciardo
22 June	Sky	Austrian Grand Prix	Massa	Perez	Rosberg
6 July	BBC	British Grand Prix	Rosberg	Hamilton	Hamilton
20 July	Sky	German Grand Prix
27 July	Sky	Hungarian Grand Prix
24 August	BBC	Belgian Grand Prix
7 September	BBC	Italian Grand Prix
21 September	Sky	Singapore Grand Prix
5 October	BBC	Japanese Grand Prix
12 October	BBC	Russian Grand Prix
2 November	Sky	United States Grand Prix
9 November	Sky	Brazilian Grand Prix
23 November	BBC	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

STANDINGS
Drivers' Championship

P	Driver	Team	Points
01	Nico Rosberg (Ger)	Mercedes	165 (3 wins)
02	Lewis Hamilton (Gbr)	Mercedes	161 (5 wins)
03	Daniel Ricciardo (Aus)	Red Bull-Renault	98 (1 win)
04	Fernando Alonso (Spa)	Ferrari	87
05	Valtteri Bottas (Fin)	Williams-Mercedes	73
06	Sebastian Vettel (Ger)	Red Bull-Renault	70
07	Nico Hulkenberg (Ger)	Force India-Mercedes	63
08	Jenson Button (Gbr)	McLaren-Mercedes	55
09	*Kevin Magnussen (Den)	McLaren-Mercedes	35
10	Felipe Massa (Brz)	Williams-Mercedes	30
11	Sergio Pérez (Mex)	Force India-Mercedes	28
12	Kimi Räikkönen (Fin)	Ferrari	19
13	Jean-Eric Vergne (Fra)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	9
14	Romain Grosjean (Fra)	Lotus-Renault	8
15	*Daniil Kyvat (Rus)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	6
16	Jules Bianchi (Fra)	Marussia-Ferrari	2
17	Adrian Sutil (Ger)	Sauber-Ferrari	0
18	*Marcus Ericsson (Swe)	Caterham-Renault	0
19	Pastor Maldonado (Ven)	Lotus-Renault	0
20	Esteban Gutiérrez (Mex)	Sauber-Ferrari	0
21	Max Chilton (Gbr)	Marussia-Ferrari	0
22	Kamui Kobayashi (Jpn)	Caterham-Renault	0

*= Debut season in F1

Constructors' Championship

P	Team	Points
01	Mercedes	326 (8 wins)
02	Red Bull-Renault	168 (1 win)
03	Ferrari	106
04	Williams-Mercedes	103
05	Force India-Mercedes	91
06	McLaren-Mercedes	90
07	Toro Rosso-Renault	15
08	Lotus-Renault	8
09	Marussia-Ferrari	2
10	Sauber-Ferrari	0
11	Caterham-Renault	0

F1 2014: More to come from Mercedes pair

MERCEDES boss Niki Lauda moved to heal a growing rift between his two drivers Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg following a tetchy Monaco Grand Prix.

Rosberg won in Monte Carlo for the second year in a row to overtake Hamilton in the Drivers' Championship - but the weekend was punctuated by several events which frustrated the Briton.

First, in qualifying, Hamilton was prevented from a run on pole after Rosberg caused yellow flags to be waved by parking at Mirabeau.

It didn't look intentional - replays showed Rosberg locking up and struggling with the steering wheel - but it was understandable why Hamilton took a dim view of the incident and remained tight-lipped in a seriously awkward interview afterwards.

After all, pole position is everything at Monaco.

Since 2004, only one driver has won having failed to take pole - and that driver was Hamilton in 2008 in his only victory at F1's most glamorous venue.

Could he do it again? Well, ultimately, no he couldn't - but he felt he was even denied a fair chance in the race after Mercedes failed to bring him into pit when it was obvious a safety car was going to be needed to clear up Adrian Sutil's accident.

Hamilton said: "An opportunity occurred where I could have come in. When I was at McLaren, l would have been pulled in on that lap and that may have given me the smallest advantage to get the jump over the safety car."

It may be a moot point anyway. Having trailed his team-mate for most of the race by less than a second, Hamilton ultimately finished a distant in a second place after suffering a problem with his vision when a piece of debris became lodged in his eye.

Nevertheless, the wounds from the weekend will take longer to clear up.

Hamilton even went as far as to say he and Rosberg were "not friends" despite him having shared a close competitive relationship with the German since they were both teenagers.

Yes, it is not quite on the level of a Prost-Senna dispute just yet - but it is providing fascinating viewing in a season which has already effectively become all about Mercedes.

The F1 W05 is so superior to all of the rest of the cars on the grid that it has taken every pole and won every race.

Indeed, the Mercedes team is currently enjoying a streak of five successive 1-2s, which is something that was not even achieved by either the dominant McLaren MP4/4 in 1988 or Williams FW14B in 1992.

In the standings, Rosberg (122) leads Hamilton by four points despite two fewer race wins after the Briton had to retire from the season opener in Australia due to engine trouble.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso cuts a frustrated figure again in third on 61 points which is as many points as he is adrift from the lead.

Meanwhile, Daniel Ricciardo, in fourth on 54 points, is comfortably outperforming his Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel.

The four-time defending champion sits sixth on 45 points, two behind Force India's Nico Hülkenberg - while Valtteri Bottas is an impressive seventh for Williams ahead of the two McLarens of Jenson Button and Kevin Magnussen.

Further down the grid, the big news in Monaco came from Marussia who finally scored their first points in a Grand Prix at the 83rd attempt thanks to Jules Bianchi's ninth place.

"Yes!!!!!!!!!!" was the reaction on the official Marussia feed on Twitter - and few would begrudge them their success after an agonising four-year wait.

F1 2014 now moves on to Montreal in Canada on 8 June before a first Austrian Grand Prix in 11 years on 22 June.

Then, in July, Hamilton and Rosberg will enjoy home advantage in successive races at Silverstone and Hockenheim.

Only time will tell if they are genuinely friends or just colleagues in a battle which already looks like going all of the way.

Date	TV		Pole position	Fastest lap	Winner
16 March	Sky	Australian Grand Prix	Hamilton	Rosberg	Rosberg
30 March	BBC	Malaysian Grand Prix	Hamilton	Hamilton	Hamilton
6 April	Sky	Bahrain Grand Prix	Rosberg	Rosberg	Hamilton
20 April	Sky	Chinese Grand Prix	Hamilton	Rosberg	Hamilton
11 May	BBC	Spanish Grand Prix	Hamilton	Vettel	Hamilton
25 May	Sky	Monaco Grand Prix	Rosberg	Räikkönen	Rosberg
8 June	BBC	Canadian Grand Prix
22 June	Sky	Austrian Grand Prix
6 July	BBC	British Grand Prix
20 July	Sky	German Grand Prix
27 July	Sky	Hungarian Grand Prix
24 August	BBC	Belgian Grand Prix
7 September	BBC	Italian Grand Prix
21 September	Sky	Singapore Grand Prix
5 October	BBC	Japanese Grand Prix
12 October	BBC	Russian Grand Prix
2 November	Sky	United States Grand Prix
9 November	Sky	Brazilian Grand Prix
23 November	BBC	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

STANDINGS
Drivers' Championship

P	Driver	Team	Points
01	Nico Rosberg (Ger)	Mercedes	122 (2 wins)
02	Lewis Hamilton (Gbr)	Mercedes	118 (4 wins)
03	Fernando Alonso (Spa)	Ferrari	61
04	Daniel Ricciardo (Aus)	Red Bull-Renault	54
05	Nico Hülkenberg (Ger)	Force India-Mercedes	47
06	Sebastian Vettel (Ger)	Red Bull-Renault	45
07	Valtteri Bottas (Fin)	Williams-Mercedes	34
08	Jenson Button (Gbr)	McLaren-Mercedes	31
09	*Kevin Magnussen (Den)	McLaren-Mercedes	21
10	Sergio Perez (Mex)	Force India-Mercedes	20
11	Felipe Massa (Brz)	Williams-Mercedes	18
12	Kimi Räikkönen (Fin)	Ferrari	17
13	Romain Grosjean (Fra)	Lotus-Renault	8
14	Jean-Eric Vergne (Fra)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	4
15	*Daniil Kyvat (Rus)	Toro-Rosso-Renault	4
16	Jules Bianchi (Fra)	Marussia-Ferrari	2
17	*Marcus Ericsson (Swe)	Caterham-Renault	0
18	Adrian Sutil (Ger)	Sauber-Ferrari	0
19	Esteban Gutiérrez (Mex)	Sauber-Ferrari	0
20	Max Chilton (Gbr)	Marussia-Ferrari	0
21	Kamui Kobayashi (Jpn)	Caterham-Renault	0
22	Pastor Maldonado (Ven)	Lotus-Renault	0

*= Debut season in F1

Constructors' Championship

P	Team	Points
01	Mercedes	240 (6 wins)
02	Red Bull-Renault	99
03	Ferrari	78
04	Force India-Mercedes	67
05	McLaren-Mercedes	52
06	Williams-Mercedes	52
07	Lotus-Renault	8
08	Toro Rosso-Renault	8
09	Marussia-Ferrari	2
10	Sauber-Ferrari	0
11	Caterham-Renault	0