Lewis Hamilton capped his title-winning Formula One season with a perfect race as Sebastian Vettel was forced to play second fiddle yet again. JUANDRE JOUBERT reports.

The race start was exactly what Mercedes wanted, with both Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas getting off the line in perfect fashion by not letting Vettel get in between them.

Both the Red Bull drivers lost places. Max Verstappen had a very bad start when the Dutchman somehow found himself in 10th, but he quickly made his way through the field.

There was a huge accident on the very first lap as Nico Hulkenberg attempted to swipe across the front of Romain Grosjean. He appeared to misjudge Grosjean’s track position and as he pulled right, he clipped the Haas and was sent spectacularly rolling towards the barriers, ending upside down and with worrying flames emerging from his car.

As the world anxiously watched, there was relief when Hulkenberg’s radio message finally played out: ‘I’m hanging here like a cow!’

The safety car was needed to clear the wreckage, and at the restart the Mercedes drivers caught Vettel napping as they sped off and opened up a two-second gap over the Ferrari.

Kimi Raikkonen retired a couple of laps later as his final drive for the Italian team ended in a DNF when his Ferrari broke down due to engine failure. Hamilton’s engineer decided to pit him under the VSC, a decision that won him the race in the end as he saved a lot of time when the other drivers could not speed under the VSC.

All of the front-runners pitted early, bar Ricciardo, since the Australian was hoping for the rain visible on radar to arrive. It did, but not significantly enough to force a change to intermediate tyres. Once he finally came in for a fresh set, Hamilton regained the lead.

The Brit controlled the pace nicely from thereon and it seemed as if Mercedes were going to claim yet another one-two finish this season. But on lap 35 Bottas made two errors that allowed Vettel to reel him in and snatch second away from the Finn.

On lap 38, more mistakes from Bottas allowed Verstappen to take the final podium place. Bottas was passed by Ricciardo as he went from second to fifth in the space of four laps.

There was no further action at the front as Hamilton took the chequered flag for the 11th time this season to cap  a magnificent year for the 33-year-old driver.

Vettel had a lonely run to second and he was followed home by the Red Bull pair of Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo.

Ricciardo was unable to claim that podium finish he so dearly wanted in his 100th and final race for Red Bull before he moves to Renault. Bottas ended up fifth.

Fernando Alonso finished his final F1 race in 11th.

Race Classification:

Final championship standings:

Photo: F1.com