2014 Japanese Grand Prix

  2014 Japanese Grand Prix

Race details
Race 15 of 19 in the 2014 Formula One season
Suzuka Circuit
Date	5 October 2014
Official name	2014 Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix[1]
Location	Suzuka Circuit Suzuka, Japan
Course	Permanent racing facility 5.807 km (3.608 mi)
Distance	44 laps, 255.508 km (158.752 mi)
Scheduled Distance	53 laps, 307.771 km (191.224 mi)
Weather	Rainy periods with occasional dry spells. Maximum temperatures reaching 22 degrees during the day.
Attendance	142,000
Pole position
Driver	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes
Time	1:32.506
Fastest lap
Driver	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes
Time	1:51.600 on lap 39
Podium
First	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes
Second	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes
Third	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault
Lap leaders

The 2014 Japanese Grand Prix (formally known as the 2014 Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix)^[1] was a Formula One motor race that was held on 5 October 2014 at the Suzuka Circuit in Suzuka, Japan.^[2] The race was the fifteenth round of the 2014 season, and marked the forty-first running of the Japanese Grand Prix.

Nico Rosberg started the race from pole position,^[3] but was overtaken by his team-mate Lewis Hamilton, who won the race after it was called off due to heavy rain and a serious accident suffered by Marussia driver Jules Bianchi. The race marked the third time two red flags have been shown in a single Formula One race after the 1987 Austrian Grand Prix and the 1990 Belgian Grand Prix.

Report

Background

Lewis Hamilton crashed during free practice 3

Typhoon Phanfone, classified as a category one storm, was forecasted to make landfall over the eastern Japanese coast on the Sunday of the Grand Prix, accompanied by heavy rain and winds of up to 240 km/h. Although the predicted course of the storm was expected to miss Suzuka, the rain from the northern edge of the storm was expected to drench the circuit with steadily increasing heavy rain.^[4]

Race

Nico Hülkenberg, pictured during free practice

Eventual race winner Lewis Hamilton in the race

Heavy rain meant that the race was initially started behind the safety car, but the race was red flagged on lap 2, when it became clear that the track was far too wet for racing. Unconventionally, instead of requiring all participants to stop on the grid, they were permitted to line-up in the pitlane (which was reportedly done to cater for the possibility of the event being cancelled altogether and allowing easier access by the each team to their cars). Nearly 20 minutes later, the rain had eased up and the race was restarted, once again behind the safety car. Fernando Alonso had to retire from the race when his car turned itself off shortly after the restart.

The safety car pulled in and the race was green flagged on lap 9. Jenson Button benefited greatly by immediately following the safety car into the pits for intermediate tyres, moving up to third position after the remaining drivers followed suit shortly after. Lewis Hamilton, having started the race behind his team-mate Nico Rosberg, managed to overtake him for the race lead at turn one on lap 29, with Rosberg struggling with oversteer.

Red Bull had elected to run a set-up more suitable for wet conditions in this race, sacrificing qualifying performance.^[5] This gamble paid off for them in the race, with Sebastian Vettel finishing third and Daniel Ricciardo fourth, from ninth and sixth on the grid respectively.

Jules Bianchi crash

The race was ended under the safety car, with the red flag shown on lap 46 and the final race results accordingly taken from the running order at the end of lap 44.^[6] This premature ending was due to Jules Bianchi, on lap 43, colliding at high speed with a marshal's crane tractor that was tending to the removal of Adrian Sutil's Sauber car, which had spun and crashed on lap 42 in the run-off area on the outside of the Dunlop Curve (turn 7) of the circuit. Bianchi was reported as being unconscious after the crash, following his failure to respond to a radio call from Marussia at the time and the marshals that went to his rescue. He was taken by road ambulance to the Mie University hospital under police escort as the FIA stated that the medical helicopter was unable to fly due to the precarious weather conditions,^{[7][8][9][10]} although it took off a short time afterwards.^[11][12]

According to his father later that same day, Bianchi then underwent an operation to reduce severe bruising to his head.^[13] The FIA subsequently released a statement that CT scans have shown Bianchi suffered a "severe head injury" in the crash, and he would be transferred to intensive care following surgery.^[14] Bianchi's family subsequently reported that he had a diffuse axonal injury, which is a common traumatic brain injury^[15] in vehicle accidents involving high deceleration.

Post-race

With Kimi Räikkönen finishing 12th and Fernando Alonso retiring, this marked the first Grand Prix that Scuderia Ferrari failed to score a point since the 2010 British Grand Prix (81 races), as well as the first time since the 2009 Singapore Grand Prix (94 races) that a Ferrari-powered car failed to score.

With a maximum potential of 125 points remaining following the race and being 127 points behind championship leader Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel officially conceded the World Drivers' Championship, ending a consecutive run of four titles.

Out of respect for the seriously injured Jules Bianchi, no champagne was sprayed by Lewis Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel on the podium.

Classification

Qualifying

Pos.	No.	Driver	Constructor	Q1	Q2	Q3	Grid
1	6	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:33.671	1:32.950	1:32.506	1
2	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:33.611	1:32.982	1:32.703	2
3	77	Valtteri Bottas	Williams-Mercedes	1:34.301	1:33.443	1:33.128	3
4	19	Felipe Massa	Williams-Mercedes	1:34.483	1:33.551	1:33.527	4
5	14	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1:34.497	1:33.675	1:33.740	5
6	3	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull-Renault	1:35.593	1:34.466	1:34.075	6
7	20	Kevin Magnussen	McLaren-Mercedes	1:34.930	1:34.229	1:34.242	7
8	22	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1:35.150	1:34.648	1:34.317	8
9	1	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	1:35.517	1:34.784	1:34.432	9
10	7	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	1:34.984	1:34.771	1:34.548	10
11	25	Jean-Éric Vergne	Toro Rosso-Renault	1:35.155	1:34.984		201
12	11	Sergio Pérez	Force India-Mercedes	1:35.439	1:35.089		11
13	26	Daniil Kvyat	Toro Rosso-Renault	1:35.210	1:35.092		12
14	27	Nico Hülkenberg	Force India-Mercedes	1:35.000	1:35.099		13
15	99	Adrian Sutil	Sauber-Ferrari	1:35.736	1:35.364		14
16	21	Esteban Gutiérrez	Sauber-Ferrari	1:35.308	1:35.681		15
17	13	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus-Renault	1:35.917			221
18	8	Romain Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	1:35.984			16
19	9	Marcus Ericsson	Caterham-Renault	1:36.813			17
20	17	Jules Bianchi	Marussia-Ferrari	1:36.943			18
21	10	Kamui Kobayashi	Caterham-Renault	1:37.015			19
22	4	Max Chilton	Marussia-Ferrari	1:37.481			21
107% time: 1:40.163
Source:[3]

Notes:

• ^1 — Pastor Maldonado and Jean-Éric Vergne both received a ten-place grid penalty for exceeding their quota of five engine components for the season.^[16][17]

Race

Pos.	No.	Driver	Constructor	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	44	1:51:43.021	2	25
2	6	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	44	+9.180	1	18
3	1	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	44	+29.122	9	15
4	3	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull-Renault	44	+38.818	6	12
5	22	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	44	+1:07.550	8	10
6	77	Valtteri Bottas	Williams-Mercedes	44	+1:53.773	3	8
7	19	Felipe Massa	Williams-Mercedes	44	+1:55.126	4	6
8	27	Nico Hülkenberg	Force India-Mercedes	44	+1:55.948	13	4
9	25	Jean-Éric Vergne	Toro Rosso-Renault	44	+2:07.638	20	2
10	11	Sergio Pérez	Force India-Mercedes	43	+1 Lap	11	1
11	26	Daniil Kvyat	Toro Rosso-Renault	43	+1 Lap	12
12	7	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	43	+1 Lap	10
13	21	Esteban Gutiérrez	Sauber-Ferrari	43	+1 Lap	15
14	20	Kevin Magnussen	McLaren-Mercedes	43	+1 Lap	7
15	8	Romain Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	43	+1 Lap	16
162	13	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus-Renault	43	+1 Lap	22
17	9	Marcus Ericsson	Caterham-Renault	43	+1 Lap	17
18	4	Max Chilton	Marussia-Ferrari	43	+1 Lap	21
19	10	Kamui Kobayashi	Caterham-Renault	43	+1 Lap	19
20	17	Jules Bianchi	Marussia-Ferrari	41	Accident	18
21	99	Adrian Sutil	Sauber-Ferrari	40	Accident	14
Ret	14	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	2	Electronics	5
Source:[18]

Notes:

• ^2 — Pastor Maldonado had 20 seconds added to race time for pit-lane speeding.^[18]

Standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings Pos. Driver Points 1 Lewis Hamilton 266 2 Nico Rosberg 256 3 Daniel Ricciardo 193 1 4 Sebastian Vettel 139 1 5 Fernando Alonso 133

Constructors' Championship standings Pos. Constructor Points 1 Mercedes 522 2 Red Bull-Renault 332 3 Williams-Mercedes 201 4 Ferrari 178 5 Force India-Mercedes 122

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

References

External links

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