Valtteri Bottas (Pole, P2, 18 pts): 8.5/10
Initially Valtteri Bottas seemed to have the clear upper hand at Mercedes this weekend, looking much happier in the car than his team mate on Friday. He carried that form into qualifying and took pole position by six thousandths of a second. His launch off the grid at the start of the race on Sunday wasn't perhaps as sharp as that of his team mate but Bottas still ensured that he confidently rebuffed Hamilton's advances over the opening laps, making the point that he was no pushover. It was all going according to plan until that curious decision to pit on lap 16 to change to like-for-like medium tyres, locking him into making another stop later in the race. Even worse, a safety car shortly afterwards gifted Hamilton a 'free' stop that effectively handed him victory, and there was nothing that Bottas could do about it and it was soon clear that on this occasion second place was the best he could manage - and that it was very much second best as far as Bottas was concerned.
