2016 F1 Round 16 Malaysian GP, Ricciardo Beats Verstappen in Red Bull One-Two

The Malaysian Grand Prix took place over 56 laps at Sepang. Hamilton started from pole and quickly took the lead, while Rosberg dropped to 17th after a first-lap collision. Ricciardo and Verstappen followed the Mercedes runners.

Archive image of Hamilton retiring with a car failure during the 2016 Malaysian Grand Prix

At the first corner, Vettel locked his wheels with three cars alongside one another, making light contact with Verstappen before hitting Rosberg and damaging his own left-front suspension. Vettel retired on the spot, while Rosberg spun but was able to continue.

Ricciardo and Verstappen took turns closing on Hamilton. Red Bull brought Verstappen in early, and fresh soft tyres helped him move briefly to the front. After Hamilton pitted on lap 20, the lead changed hands several times as the tyre strategies unfolded.

On lap 38, Rosberg passed Räikkönen at Turn 2 for fourth, with the two cars making contact. The stewards subsequently gave Rosberg a ten-second time penalty, leaving him needing to build a sufficient gap over the remaining laps to keep a podium place.

On lap 39, Ricciardo and Verstappen fought wheel-to-wheel for position. Hamilton was still leading by more than 20 seconds at that stage.

On lap 41, flames emerged from Hamilton’s Mercedes engine and it stopped working, forcing him to retire from a commanding lead. A Virtual Safety Car period followed, and both Red Bulls made their final pit stops on lap 41 and held the top two positions. Ricciardo ultimately won by 2.443 seconds.

Rosberg finished third, retaining a podium place by around three seconds over Räikkönen despite his penalty. Bottas was fifth, Pérez sixth and Alonso recovered from the back of the grid to seventh. Button took ninth in his 300th race, while Palmer scored his first career point in tenth.

Gutiérrez retired after losing his left-front wheel on lap 42. Massa had to start from the pit lane after stalling on the formation lap and eventually finished 13th. Grosjean, Magnussen and Nasr also failed to finish, while Ocon received two separate five-second penalties for pit-lane speeding. Rosberg’s third place extended his championship lead to 23 points.