Nico Rosberg eased to his sixth victory of the 2016 season with a lights to flag Belgian Grand Prix win at Spa-Francorchamps, helping him to close the gap to championship leader and Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton.
Hamilton did enough to limit the damage though, coming through from 21st to finish third behind Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo. The Australian putting in a strong drive to take a podium finish to keep his team ahead of Ferrari in the standings.
The race saw early drama as Max Verstappen got a slow start, allowing Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel to jump ahead. However as the three approached Turn 1, they all made contact with Vettel spinning round and dropping to last.
Raikkonen meanwhile suffered a puncture and Verstappen a broken front-wing as they too tumbled down the order, with both forced to stop for repairs.
The opening lap also saw the retirement of Jenson Button and Pascal Wehrlein after the Manor driver rear-ended the McLaren, causing terminal damage to both cars.
Carlos Sainz retired moments later with the Spaniard suffering a right-rear puncture, which tore the rear-wing off of his Toro Rosso car.
During all the carnage of the opening lap, last placed Fernando Alonso had climbed to tenth and Hamilton to P15.
The pair made up extra places before Kevin Magnussen lost the rear of his Renault and suffered a huge high-speed accident at the exit of Eau Rouge. The Dane escaped with an ankle injury despite completely destroying his chassis.
That incident brought out the safety car for ten laps before the race was eventually red flagged as the damage to the barrier was too severe.
The stoppage allowed all the drivers to change their tyres as they lined up in the pitlane for a well earned break. At this point, Alonso was sitting fourth and Hamilton fifth – a result neither could have ever imagined before the race.
Force India's Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez gained from the drama too, finishing fourth and fifth respectively, whilst Vettel recovered to finish sixth.
Alonso would go on to finish seventh as he held off the Williams of Valtteri Bottas in eighth ahead of Raikkonen and Felipe Massa.
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