The 2017 Spanish Grand Prix (formally known as the Formula 1 Gran Premio de España Pirelli 2017) was a Formula One motor race held on 14 May 2017 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in Montmeló, Spain. The race was the fifth round of the 2017 FIA Formula One World Championship and marked the forty-seventh running of the Spanish Grand Prix as a World Championship event since the inaugural season in , and the twenty-seventh time that a World Championship round had been held at Catalunya.

Report Free practice Both of Friday's practice sessions finished with an identical top six on the timesheet, with Lewis Hamilton heading the list, his Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas second and the Ferraris of Kimi Räikkönen and Sebastian Vettel third and fourth respectively. Next came the Red Bulls, with Max Verstappen fifth in both sessions and Daniel Ricciardo sixth. McLaren Honda's run of poor reliability continued, with home favourite Fernando Alonso sitting out most of the first session after his car suffered a major engine failure during his first lap. Alonso was able to take part in the second session, but had to wait until almost half an hour into it while his team was completing an engine change.

The third practice session, on Saturday morning, finished with Räikkönen quickest, Vettel second, and Hamilton third. Bottas was fourth after his engine suffered a water leak and he was only able to run towards the end of the session, once Mercedes had changed the engine. The Red Bull pair of Verstappen and Ricciardo were again fifth and sixth.

Qualifying Lewis Hamilton claimed pole position from Sebastian Vettel by 0.051 seconds. Vettel was initially ordered to stop the car on track for an engine problem in Q1 but he questioned the decision and the problem was resolved and allowed him to continue. Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Räikkönen filled up the second row followed by the Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo. Fernando Alonso delivered a shocking result to get his underpowered McLaren into Q3 and then qualifying as the best of the rest behind Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull. The top ten was filled out by Sergio Pérez, Felipe Massa and Esteban Ocon.

Race Vettel had a better start than Hamilton and led into the first corner. An incident with Bottas, Räikkönen and Verstappen meant that both Räikkönen and Verstappen retired with suspension damage and Bottas was left slightly handicapped. The incident also caused Felipe Massa to obtain a puncture, while also forcing Alonso off the track, leading them to eventually finish the race outside of the points. This left the top ten as Vettel, Hamilton, Bottas, Ricciardo, Pérez, Ocon, Hülkenberg, Magnussen, Sainz and Grosjean. Hamilton stuck with Vettel for fourteen laps, when Ferrari decided to cover off the undercut by pitting for softs. Hamilton meanwhile stayed out on track for seven extra laps and rejoined around seven seconds behind Vettel on the medium tyres. Vettel lost around four seconds to Hamilton trying to get past Bottas, who hadn't pitted yet, before completing a spectacular overtake on Bottas.

With just over thirty laps remaining, the McLaren of Vandoorne drove into Massa and retired with suspension damage, earning him a grid penalty at the next race. The Virtual Safety Car (VSC) was brought out so his car could be removed and this allowed Hamilton to pit for the faster soft tyres, while not losing much time to Vettel due to the limited speed. Vettel then pitted for the slower medium tyres as was required, just when the VSC had finished, resulting in Vettel coming out of the pitlane alongside Hamilton. They touched wheels and Hamilton was forced off the track and had to fall behind Vettel. Then on lap 38, the Mercedes of Bottas suffered an engine failure (from the engine he had used for all previous races) and this promoted Ricciardo into a podium place. Meanwhile, Pascal Wehrlein who was doing a one-stop, used the VSC to his advantage and came out of the pits in eighth; he then got promoted to seventh following Bottas's retirement. However, he received a five-second penalty for an error in entering the pit lane.

Hamilton, with faster tyres, then managed to overtake Vettel for the lead on the pit straight on lap 44 and held on to the lead to win the race, reducing Vettel's lead in the championship to 6 points and increasing Mercedes's lead in the Constructors' Championship to eight points over Ferrari. Ricciardo finished third for his first podium of the season and took the fifth place in the Championship from Verstappen. Despite new upgrades, his Red Bull was 75 seconds behind Hamilton, the furthest back they had been all season, and Ricciardo was the only other car apart from the two leaders to finish on the lead lap. The next to cross the line were the Force Indias of Pérez and Ocon. Then Nico Hülkenberg finished in sixth place for Renault, their highest finish since returning to the sport in 2016. Wehrlein crossed the line in seventh but was demoted to eighth with his penalty, still picking up four valuable points for the struggling Sauber team, with the Toro Rosso of Carlos Sainz being promoted to the seventh in his stead. Kvyat and Grosjean finished ninth and tenth respectively after Kevin Magnussen, who was running in ninth, suffered a late puncture due to contact with Kvyat and fell to fourteenth. Fernando Alonso finished in twelfth, the first time he had finished a race in the season, but he admitted he was lacking the race pace to go with his superb qualifying.

Classification Qualifying DriverConstructor Q1Q2Q3144 Lewis HamiltonMercedes 1:20.5111:20.2101:19.149125 Sebastian VettelFerrari1:20.9391:20.2951:19.2002377 Valtteri BottasMercedes1:20.9911:20.3001:19.373347 Kimi RäikkönenFerrari1:20.7421:20.6211:19.4394533 Max Verstappen1:21.4301:20.7221:19.706563 Daniel RicciardoRed Bull Racing-TAG Heuer1:21.7041:20.8551:20.1756714 Fernando AlonsoMcLaren-Honda1:22.0151:21.2511:21.0487811 Sergio PérezForce India-Mercedes1:21.9981:21.2391:21.0708919 Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes1:22.1381:21.2221:21.23291031 Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes 1:21.9011:21.1481:21.272101120 Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1:21.9451:21.329111255 Carlos Sainz Jr.Toro Rosso1:21.9411:21.371121327 Nico HülkenbergRenault1:22.0911:21.39713148 Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1:21.8221:21.517141594 Pascal WehrleinSauber-Ferrari1:22.3271:21.80315169 Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari1:22.332161730 Jolyon PalmerRenault1:22.401171818 Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes 1:22.41118192McLaren-Honda1:22.532202026 Daniil KvyatToro Rosso1:22.74619 107% time: 1:26.147 Source:

– Stoffel Vandoorne received a ten-place grid penalty for use of additional power unit elements.

Race Driver Constructor Time/Retired Points144 Lewis HamiltonMercedes661:35:56.49712525 Sebastian VettelFerrari66 +3.49021833 Daniel Ricciardo66 +1:15.820615411 Sergio PérezForce India-Mercedes65 +1 Lap8 12531 Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes65 +1 Lap1010627 Nico HülkenbergRenault65 +1 Lap138755 Carlos Sainz Jr.Toro Rosso65 +1 Lap126894 Pascal WehrleinSauber-Ferrari65 +1 Lap154926 Daniil KvyatToro Rosso65 +1 Lap192108 Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari65 +1 Lap141119 Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari64 +2 Laps161214 Fernando AlonsoMcLaren-Honda64 +2 Laps71319 Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes64 +2 Laps91420 Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari64 +2 Laps111530 Jolyon PalmerRenault64 +2 Laps171618 Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes64 +2 Laps18 77 Valtteri BottasMercedes38Engine3 2McLaren-Honda32Accident20 33 Max Verstappen1Collision damage5 7 Kimi RäikkönenFerrari0Collision damage4Source:

Notes – Pascal Wehrlein finished 7th, but received a 5-second penalty for failing to keep to the right of the pit-entry bollard.

Championship standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings DriverPoints 1 Sebastian Vettel104 2 Lewis Hamilton98 3 Valtteri Bottas63 4 Kimi Räikkönen49 15 Daniel Ricciardo37Source:

Constructors' Championship standings ConstructorPoints 1 Mercedes161 2 Ferrari153 372 4 Force India-Mercedes53 15 Toro Rosso21Source:

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

See also 2017 Barcelona Formula 2 round 2017 Barcelona GP3 Series round

References

External links

The race on the official Formula One website