Portuguese GP – As it Happened: Hamilton breaks Schumacher’s record, taking 92nd win!

Micheal Schumacher's record finally falls in spectacular style.

15 mins read

Hamilton takes a record-breaking 92nd win today in Portugal.
Lewis took lead on lap 20 after damp opening laps that saw Sainz lead the race.
The champion has had to make more overtakes than a pole sitter would have liked.
Leclerc an impressive 4th on the track.
Vettel again stuck in the midfield.

15:35
That’s all from me today, look out for my retrospective article on Hamiltons journey to 92 to come.
As for live coverage, we are back next week in Imola for the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix.
Qualifying will start at 13:00 with coverage from 12:45 her on Brig Sport.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend everyone, this guy certainly will.

15:26
You seen the moment yet? Here you go.

15:20
Someone has nabbed this amazing graphic that Sky Sports put together to show Hamiltons 92 wins, don’t mind if we do.

15:11
Back in the day, when Schumacher overtook Prost’s record for most wins taking his 52nd win at Spa back in 2001, we wondered how far he could go. With Hamilton still to sign a new contract with Mercedes and stable regulations for next year, it seems breaking the 100 mark is a given, but how far can he push it?

1. Lewis Hamilton92
2. Michael Schumacher91
3. Sebastian Vettel53
4. Alain Prost51
5. Ayrton Senna41

15:08
Of the 92 wins 22 of them were taken with his first team Mclaren.
His old team paying tribute to their former driver on twitter:

15:00
Post-race interview with Martin Brundle on Sky Sports:
Hamilton says: “Today was tough, it was all about temperatures. That was something with the setup, I pre-empted. We got some spitting right at the start, I had a good start but then into Turn Seven had a huge oversteer moment.

“I should have tried to defend from Valtteri but I thought I’d come back later on, and that was what I was able to do.

“I could never have dreamed of being where I am today. I didn’t have a magic ball when I chose to come to this team and partner with great people, but here I am and what I can tell you is I’m trying to make the most of it every single day.

“It’s going to take some time to sink in. I was still pushing flat out coming across the line, I’m still very much in race mode mentally. I can’t find the right words at the moment.”

14:52
Lemme catch my breath and I’ll type up the post race comments in a moment for you to all digest.

14:45
NEW RECORD:
LEWIS HAMILTON WINS!

14:44
Perez loses the place to Gasly on the next lap and then on the last lap he loses another place to Sainz on the pit straight.

14:41
Perez gets all the elbows out in defense of his 5th place as Gasly puts the pressure on him.

14:40
23s is the lead at the front, Bottas has been completely annihilated since Hamilton took the lead back on lap 20

14:35
Hamilton has now lapped all up to and including 5th placed man Perez, as he complains of cramp, is old man time catching up with Lewis finally?

Talking of Perez, what a recovery drive from the Mexican after the coming together with Verstappen on the opening lap and fighting back from the back of the field.

14:32
17s is the lead for hamilton now, absolutely blitzed the field in the half a race he’s led, how much further up the road would he have been if his tyres had fired up from lights out?

14:30
Vettel is in the points!
With 10 laps to go, and faster cars all ahead instead of behind, this could be a rare double points finish for the Scuderia this season.
How the mighty have fallen.

14:28
Lance stroll parks up in the garage, he was running around in last place, with 10s worth of penalties to be added to.
Racing Point say he had floor damage, but it feels like it was just to avoid more damage to their pride more than anything else tbh.

14:24
Another driver struggling as his teammate is up the sharp end of the field is Albon, who has just been lapped by Verstappen. Ouchies.
Albon is currently in 12th while Max is up in 3rd.

14:22
If you’re wondering what’s happening with Vettel, I can tell you that once again his former teammate Kimi Raikonnen in the customer team Alpha Romeo, is the one that is holding the German out of the points yet again as he runs a second behind the Finn in 11th.

14:16
Albon being told by his engineer that the rain may come back, but only lightly in the next few laps.

14:13
Here are the standings from a handful of laps back

14:10
Lap 41 and Hamilton finally pits for hard tyres. Bottas takes the lead, Bottas tells his engineer he wants the soft tyre on his pit.
His pit crew give him the hards, so there goes that potential for more excitement.

14:08
Lap 38, and still Mercedes haven’t pitted any of their boys out front.
Here’s that battle that made me purr earlier, love to see it.

14:02
Perez and Ocon run side-by-side for half the lap and Perez comes out in front to take 5th, that was sublime racing, if anyone is considering Perez for next year but is doubting it, they really shouldn’t.

14:00
Is Bottas’ title hopes about to get the final nail in coffin?
The Finn reports a warning on his dash, he just can’t catch a break can this guy.

13:56
That’s 10s worth of penalties that Stroll has accumulated so far as he is given another 5s for exceeding track limits one time too many.

A lot of drivers are running around before half distance on a black and white flag. This track is more suited to motorbikes racing in the regard of the lack of high kerbs to discourage them from drifting wide.

13:54
If you were looking for some excitement up front, I’m sorry to disappoint you but Hamilton has checked out.
He now has a 7s lead over Bottas who just doesn’t have an answer for race pace yet again.

13:50
Big up for Leclerc, who is running comfortably in a net 4th but 3rd on track just now. Going by recent results and performance that car has no right running that high.

13:46
Norris and Stroll running last on the track after they both had to pit in the aftermath of Stroll’s crazy overtake attempt.
Stroll has been handed a 5s penalty for his actions to add insult to self-inflicted injury.

13:41
Hamilton has been slowly creeping up on Bottas and now he takes the lead on the pit straight on lap 20 and the record-breaking attempt is well and truly back on for the champion.

13:39
Stroll contacts with Norris!
That looked like Stroll was all out of control by the turn in and just drops the rear and damages both his and Norris front wings after spinning on the kerbs.

13:35
Verstappen losing touch of the leaders and is now 10s off the lead, surprisingly he’s only 5s ahead of Charles Leclerc in that Ferrari.

13:31
This is a wee snapshot of the incident that happened between Perez and Verstappen on the opening lap that the stewards have deemed not worthy of investigation.

13:30
Max is on the softs compared to the mediums up front. Although the mediums were a struggle on the opening laps for the leading pair, they have came into their own and now Max is starting to struggle with degredation.
So much for a 3-way-fight up front.

13:25
Max now in third, does he have the pace to trouble the Mercedes front runners? Lets hope so.

13:24
Now it’s Vertappens turn to pressure the Spaniard as Hamilton gets into 2nd and starts to think about Bottas up front and how to beat him.

13:22
Bottas retakes the lead, and promptly breaks DRS back to Sainz and Hamilton.
Hamilton will need to clear Sainz quick if he wants to win this race, never mind keep a charging Verstappen behind.

13:21
The Mercedes boys are starting to get some temperature back in their rubber and begin to reel in surprise leader Sainz

13:19
What is going on???
Sainz is well out of DRS range of Bottas who has Hamilton pressuring him from behind now.

13:17
SAINZ TAKES THE LEAD!
Carlos Sainz overtakes Bottas on lap 2 on pure pace, what a start from the Spaniard, up 6 places from the start

13:15
LIGHTS OUT!
Great start from Hamilton, Verstappen gets in front of Bottas but it doesnt last long as bottas gets back in front.
Verstappen then tags the Racing Point of Perez who ultimately spins.
Hamilton struggling and falls back to 3rd behind both Bottas and Sainz in the Mclaren.

The rain is really coming down now.

13:15
Drivers just taking their positions on the grid now to wait for the lights.

13:13
Gasly reporting drops of rain on his formation lap.

13:10
The cars head off on their formation lap, the man on pole is arguably on the back foot as the man in 2nd has been sublime all weekend untill the last lap of qualifying.

Can Hamilton keep Bottas behind and write his name in history? Or will Bottas be hungry to right the wrong from yesterday?

13:05
It’s just under 5 minutes till lights out and this fantastic looking downhill run into turn one.

With reported colder temperatures that we are usually used to on the roadshow that is this sport, whos got a tenner on a few lock ups a safety car before the first lap is even over?

12:56
Good morning/afternoon and welcome back to more live coverage of the 2020 Formula One World Championship.

Portimao is the destination this week as the teams take to a track not seen in this sport since back in testing over a decade ago.

Lewis Hamilton snuck his 97th pole right at the death yesterday, denying Bottas who had looked nailed on for the front of the grid all weekend.

Bottas needs a result this weekend, even if it’s just to remind Hamilton that he wont back down and will be there if the Champion slips up.

Verstappen threatened yesterday, but ultimately fell short yet again, can they improve their race pace relative to saturdays and really give us a race today?

David King
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Trying to find my voice in the modern digital journalism landscape.
Have a creative flair, and not scared to rock the boat.

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