Valtteri Bottas of Mercedes wins Austrian Grand Prix

Valtteri Bottas of Mercedes secured his second victory of the season by winning the Austrian Grand Prix on July 09, 2017. He finished superbly by crossing the winning line, 0.6s ahead of world championship leader Sebastian Vettel for Ferrari. Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo was third while Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes had to be content with being fourth.

It was a good day for Force India when their drivers Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon came in 7^th and 8^th respectively.  Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari came in fifth, followed by Romain Grosjean of Haas. The others to make up the first ten were Felipe Massa of William who came in 9^th and his teammate Lance Stroll who finished 10^th. Carlos Sainz of Toro Rosso, Kevin Magnussen of Haas, Fernando Alonso of McLaren and Max Verstappen of Red Bull did not finish the race.

Earlier in the race, Alonso's McLaren inadvertently collided with Verstappen’s car which spun out of control. Both the cars suffered a lot of damage and had to retire from the race.

Meanwhile, the race for Bottas was smooth in the beginning when he led from his pole position. The Finn led easily from pole and dominated the first half of the race. From lap 47 onward, Vettel was in full form as he got snapping at the heels of the Mercedes driver. The final laps were nail-biting as Vettel was a breath away from Bottas, but the latter dug in and secured a remarkable win.