Azerbaijan Grand Prix: Hamilton capitalises after Bottas blow-out

The race began with high drama, chaos and carbon fibre flying everywhere.

Sebastian Vettel, leading from the front, kept his position for much of the race before conceding it to Valtteri Bottas after a late pit stop.

After the final safety car spell, the Ferrari made one last effort to reclaim the lead - and locked up, veering wide and allowing Lewis Hamilton into P2. It was a gamble to extend his championship advantage - one which did not pay off. Bottas went back in front, Hamiton took second - and then the Finn suffered a puncture, meaning that the Brit got the win effectively by default.

Four stars out of five. A good drive. Hamilton spent the first half of the race trading fastest laps with then-leader Vettel. A reasonably early pit stop gave him warm soft tyres with 20 laps to go - which gave him the edge he needed to cling on until the chequered flag.

He was also very gracious about team-mate Bottas, who seized the lead from Vettel and then lost it after a puncture three laps from the end, running over some debris on track. On a day where other colleagues were less amenable to each other, it was nice to see.

"You're going to have to do him again. Let's go." Race engineer Simon Rennie to Daniel Ricciardo regarding team-mate Max Verstappen. It did not end well.

Ricciardo braked late and ran into the back of the younger man, who was attempting to cut back across and prevent his progress. Very bad stuff from Red Bull.

The endeavour from Carlos Sainz to get between the two Red Bulls early on and get the Renault works team in contention was fantastic - taking advantage of the duelling team-mates and dividing the pair.

Before the awful denouement, there was some marvellous wheel-to-wheel racing between Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo, with the Australian making a pass at the first corner to take his team-mate's fourth position on Lap 34.

Hamilton's early pit stop gave him good warm tyres for the closing stages, even though those final laps were interrupted by the safety car again.

Charles Leclerc did some great work in his Sauber - and it was no wonder he had some choice bits of vocabulary as he celebrated his sixth place.

Apart from the Red Bulls' efforts to self-destruct in spectacular fashion, the Ferrari team's decision to bring Vettel in for a pit stop with around a dozen laps to go and allowing Bottas to take over the lead seemed unwise at the time and even more so in retrospect.

"No! No!" shouted Romain Grosjean as while sitting pretty in P6 he sent his car into the wall behind the safety car as he weaved around the road trying to get heat into his tyres. - honourable mention to him in the facepalm category, what an absolute disaster.

Princess of pop Christina Aguilera paid a visit. Fernando Alonso had chance to say hello to her before the race.