MOTORSPORT: 100 F1 GP wins for Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton became the first centurion in Formula 1 when he scored his 100th victory in an epic Russian Grand Prix last night.

What should have been an easy win on a track where Mercedes-AMG has never been beaten in the F1 hybrid era became surprisingly tough for the seven-time champion as wet weather in qualifying mixed a grid that was also impacted by engine-swap penalties for Max Verstappen and Valtteri Bottas.

Late rain in the race completed the competition cocktail as the whole field was shaken and stirred, with Lando Norris the biggest loser as he dropped from first to seventh in his McLaren while gambling on slick tyres on a track that was like an ice rink.

“I can’t do this,” Norris said as he spun and then stopped for wet-weather tyres.

“Lando did such an amazing job. He had incredible pace. It would have been tough to get past,” said Hamilton, paying tribute to the youngster, who was rewarded with the fastest lap of the race.

Incredibly, Hamilton’s championship rival Max Verstappen drove from dead-last on the grid to finish second for Red Bull, minimising his points loss, with early leader Carlos Sainz taking third for Ferrari.

Daniel Ricciardo drove another impressive race for fourth place, despite a bungled McLaren pitstop, and pulled off several of his signature ‘lick it and send it’ passes.

Hamilton now takes a two-point lead in the championship, with seven races to run and Turkey up next on October 10.

“That was hard work. Wow, 100,” said Hamilton.

“I lost a lot of ground at the start, just trying to stay out of trouble.

“Then the rain came. What a race it provided. The team made a great call right at the end.”

The class of Hamilton and Verstappen is obvious in the comparison with their teammates, as Bottas could only manage fifth for McLaren and Sergio Perez was 11th in the second Red Bull racer.

“To come from last to second is very, very good. We'll definitely take that one,” said Verstappen.

“We didn’t lose so many points today, so that is really, really good. With the penalty we had, to lose only one spot, basically, is definitely not too bad.

“The race itself was not very easy. A lot of things happened. It was pretty tricky. It was very difficult to pass.

“But at one point it was really, really slippery. Luckily, the rain helped us to make the last jump."

For Sainz, who struggled with tyre troubles in the first third of the race, the rain also helped despite hitting while he was battling to stay on the road with a badly-worn second set of rubber.

“The rain came at the worst possible time. [But] we did exactly the right call at exactly the right time,” he said.

Ahead of the grand prix, young Aussies scooped both of of the big consolation prizes at Sochi, as F1 hopeful Oscar Piastri romped to victory in the FIA Formula 2 feature and Jack Doohan unleashed his mongrel and ignored team orders to take the F3 feature.

Piastri’s win continues his run at the top of the F2 championship while Doohan’s victory, his fourth of the season, powered his Trident squad to victory in the F3 teams’ title and gave him second place in the drivers’ championship.

2021 Russian F1 GP results:

2021 F1 points: