Skip to main content

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe
Live text
Formula 1 French GP

French Grand Prix race day

Live Text

Sort by
Raikkonen sweeps by to lead the race, while Hamilton rejoins comfortably five seconds ahead of Verstappen.
Hamilton is called into the pits at the end of lap 33.
Leclerc quickly repasses Stroll to 15th and will now chase Ericsson and Alonso.
Just 1.2 seconds between Vettel and Ricciardo now in the battle for fourth on the road, although both will be ahead of Raikkonen once the Finn pits from second.
Leclerc has pitted to swap his ultrasofts for supersofts. It drops him right back to 16th between the two Williams.
"You can do that pace," McLaren tells Vandoorne as it urges him to close on the penalised Grosjean ahead in ninth.
And Grosjean is given a 5s time penalty for the first-lap crash. He can take that at his pitstop when he makes that as he's still on the ultrasofts he started with.
Ricciardo is indeed catching Vettel - the gap between them is just 1.8 seconds now. We mentioned earlier that DRS seems too powerful here, will it be powerful enough to allow a Renault-powered car to pass a Ferrari?
Grosjean is now subject to another investigation - this time causing a first-lap condition. It's been suggested he triggered the Ocon/Gasly shunt.
Sainz and Magnussen are making their way through the cars that haven't pitted yet, they're past Hartley into 11th and 12th - though Hartley is having a go back at Magnussen (unsuccessfully).
Hulkenberg is now up to sixth with the likes of Sainz and Magnussen having pitted. Hulkenberg started on softs as he failed to get beyond Q2 yesterday so can run long - perhaps until it rains?
Verstappen was a tenth faster than Hamilton last time around, but Mercedes have a big enough window to work with that there is no need to react just yet with a pitstop.
It's not a normal pitstop for Perez, he's pulling into the garage as the team has told him there's an engine issue. That's with the new 2.1-spec Mercedes...
Lap 30/53: Hamilton, Raikkonen, Verstappen, Vettel, Ricciardo, Hulkenberg.

Hamilton, Raikkonen and Hulkenberg are yet to pit.
Ricciardo is three seconds behind Vettel. Can he use the tyre advantage to catch the Ferrari? With Vettel's five-second penalty, just finishing close behind him would be enough.
Magnussen pits from sixth place and rejoins behind Sainz, so no overall change there. Perez pits too.
Bottas makes it past Leclerc to take eighth with a straightforward move. But Bottas is now 56.7s behind race-leading team-mate Hamilton.
Verstappen has quickly put four seconds into Vettel, so those fresher tyres are serving the Red Bull very well after his pitstop.
Race control decides not to take any action against Grosjean for his trip off the road on the opening lap.
It only takes a few corners before Sainz passes Ericsson on the back straight for 14th.
Sainz rejoins alongside Ericsson and the Sauber gets ahead, so Sainz is down to 15th as he comes back out on softs.
Sirotkin is given a five-second time penalty for going too slowly behind the safety car. He's 18th and last behind team-mate Stroll.
Sainz pits from seventh place to get rid of his ultrasofts.
Leclerc fell back into Hulkenberg's range because he ran wide onto the runoff area while trying to challenge Magnussen. The Sauber now has Bottas within his DRS range.
Guess what? Hamilton puts in another fastest lap. 1m35.6s with Hammer Time fully engaged at the moment.
Top 6 following Verstappen's stop: Hamilton, Ricciardo, Raikkonen, Verstappen, Vettel, Sainz.
Verstappen rejoins just in front of Vettel, who is on tyres that are 24 laps old.
Verstappen pits from seconds, and takes on soft tyres.
Sainz still leads 'best of the rest' in sixth, with Magnussen 1.4s behind, then Hulkenberg a further 2.4s back.
"Something wrong with the tyres," Leclerc tells Sauber. He's told things are OK on the data and he should keep going. He started on ultrasofts having made Q3.
Leclerc was hassling Magnussen for seventh but now he's been caught, attacked and passed by Hulkenberg for eighth.
And another fastest lap for Hamilton - 1m36.1s. He's seven seconds clear of Verstappen now, and doesn't appear to have a lot of competition this afternoon as things stand.

By: Geoff Creighton

Published: