Lewis Hamilton led a tense race, untroubled by his teammate who was forced to start from the pit lane and eventually retire from the race. Instead, the focus was on the Red Bull drivers, who took on a different strategy to the sole Mercedes after a safety car period. The safety car came out due to Sergio Pérez's front wing exploding across the track, and the lengthy slow circling did bring about a lull in proceedings.

It picked up again to allow Jean-Éric Vergne to claw his way up to sixth, despite several penalties about infringing track limits, Kevin Magnussen to finish in the points despite worrying about the temperature of his drinks bottle, and Fernando Alonso to finish just off the podium positions, yet again.