Lewis Hamilton Lands Narrow Win In Austria
A collision on the final lap saw Lewis Hamilton beat Nico Rosberg to victory at the Austrian Grand Prix.
Lewis Hamilton snatched victory from under the nose of Nico Rosberg after the Mercedes pair came together on the final lap of a thrilling Austrian Grand Prix.
Hamilton had the momentum heading into the last lap and, as the Briton looked to overtake his team-mate around the outside of turn two, the championship leader defended his position aggressively.
Contact between the pair damaged Rosberg's front wing and tyre, allowing Hamilton an easy pass, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen and Kimi Raikkonen in the Ferrari also getting through before the chequered flag.
Rosberg had overtaken Hamilton during the first round of Mercedes pit stops, with the eventual race winner suffering from a particularly slow tyre change.
The German looked to be winning the strategic battle as the race wore on, but after switching to supersofts on lap 56, Hamilton began to loom large in his mirrors.
Hamilton had changed to a new set of softs a lap before Rosberg's stop and reaped the benefits to claim an important victory – the latest chapter in Mercedes' long-running intra-team rivalry.
Stewards subsequently announced that they would investigate Rosberg over the collision and his failure to stop with a damaged car.
In a race dominated by strategic decisions, Ferrari's call to keep Sebastian Vettel out for 27 laps without a stop backfired as his rear-right tyre exploded on the start-finish straight.