Lewis Hamilton has won the 2017 Japanese Grand Prix in what was a tense battle with Red Bull driver Max Verstappen, who finished in second. Fellow Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo completed the podium.
At the start Hamilton made a decent getaway and led going into the first corner. Max Verstappen made a great start and was quickly ahead of team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, before soon overtaking Ferrari driver Sebastian Vettel for second place. Esteban Ocon was another one to make a good start and was ahead of Daniel Ricciardo. On lap 1, Sainz went off and into the barrier. Meanwhile, at this point, Vettel was struggling with power and was down in sixth place.
On lap 2 the Safety Car was deployed and the order was the following: Hamilton, Verstappen, Ocon, Ricciardo, Bottas, Vettel, Perez, Massa, Hulkenberg and Magnussen. The safety car went in at the end of lap 3 and Perez immediately overtook Vettel, and on the following lap Vettel retired the car with an engine issue.
On lap 8 Marcus Ericsson hit the wall, and on the following lap the Virtual Safety Car (VSC) was deployed, and on lap 10 the VSC period finished, and immediately Ricciardo overtook Ocon round the outside of turn 1 for third, and soon after Bottas moved up into fourth ahead of the Frenchman.
On lap 22, Verstappen pitted from second place and re-emerged just ahead of Raikkonen. A lap later, Hamilton pitted and came out ahead of the Dutchman. At this point the order was: Ricciardo (who had not stopped), Bottas (who had not stopped), Hamilton, Verstappen and Raikkonen.
Ricciardo pitted on lap 26 for a fresh set of softs, and at this point Bottas was leading. Meanwhile, Hamilton and Verstappen were both closing in on Bottas and Hamilton was getting stuck behind with Verstappen closing in on him. Eventually Bottas moved over (presumably he was told to do so) for Hamilton and did hold up Verstappen for a bit longer which enabled Hamilton to just open up the gap ever so slightly.
Bottas then pitted on lap 30 for supersofts and re-emerged in fourth place, whilst Kimi Raikkonen had moved up into fifth place. On lap 39 Hulkenberg pitted (onto supersofts) and quickly managed to overtake Pierre Gasly. However, his DRS remained stuck open and he eventually had to retire on lap 40. On lap 45, Stroll had a car failure and went off on the grass, and he only just managed to avoid hitting Ricciardo. Since Stroll was stopped on the grass, the VSC was deployed once again.
The VSC ended on lap 50 and Alonso and Massa were battling for the final point, and as a result of this, Verstappen quickly closed to within 1.1s of Hamilton who was held up behind Alonso and Massa. Ultimately Hamilton held on to claim his fourth victory in Japan (third in Suzuka), with Verstappen finishing 1.2s behind. Ricciardo completed the podium with Bottas in fourth, less than a second behind.
Classification:
Lewis Hamilton - Mercedes
Max Verstappen - Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer
Daniel Ricciardo - Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer
Valtteri Bottas - Mercedes
Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari
Esteban Ocon - Force India-Mercedes
Sergio Perez - Force India-Mercedes
Kevin Magnussen - Haas-Ferrari
Romain Grosjean - Haas-Ferrari
Felipe Massa - Williams-Mercedes
Fernando Alonso - McLaren-Honda
Jolyon Palmer - Renault
Pierre Gasly - Toro Rosso
Stoffel Vandoorne - McLaren-Honda
Pascal Wehrlein - Sauber-Ferrari
Not classified: Lance Stroll, Nico Hulkenberg, Marcus Ericsson, Sebastian Vettel, Carlos Sainz
World Championship standings:
Lewis Hamilton - 306 points
Sebastian Vettel - 247 points
Valtteri Bottas - 234 points
Daniel Ricciardo - 192 points
Kimi Raikkonen - 148 points
Max Verstappen - 111 points
Sergio Perez - 82 points
Esteban Ocon - 65 points
Carlos Sainz - 48 points
Nico Hulkenberg - 34 points
Felipe Massa - 34 points
Lance Stroll - 32 points
Romain Grosjean - 28 points
Kevin Magnussen - 15 points
Stoffel Vandoorne - 13 points
Fernando Alonso - 10 points
Jolyon Palmer - 8 points
Pascal Wehrlein - 5 points
Daniil Kvyat - 4 points
Marcus Ericsson - 0 points
Antonio Giovinazzi - 0 points
Pierre Gasly - 0 points
Constructors' Championship standings:
Mercedes - 540 points
Ferrari - 395 points
Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer - 303 points
Force India-Mercedes - 147 points
Williams-Mercedes - 66 points
Toro Rosso - 52 points
Haas-Ferrari - 43 points
Renault - 42 points
McLaren-Honda - 23 points
Sauber-Ferrari - 5 points