Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel battle to match the late Argentine's 1950s feat of five world championships.
Lewis Hamilton was 'shocked' with the pace of Mercedes after notching a record-extending eighth pole position at the Australian Grand Prix ahead of team mate Valtteri Bottas as they thrashed their Formula One rivals in qualifying on Saturday.
Lewis Hamilton continued his season's sweep of qualifying at the Bahrain Grand Prix.
Lewis Hamilton's world championship defence got off to a flying start on Sunday with a crushing victory for Mercedes in the season-opening Australian Grand Prix as Formula One rivals succumbed to a farcical rash of reliability problems.
The Finn was a mere 0.006 of a second quicker than the five times world champion as the two Silver Arrows once again locked out the front row of the grid on a cloudy afternoon at Silverstone.
Adrian Newey accused Red Bull's rivals of being afraid to supply them with engines for 2016 and warned there is a real risk of the four times world champions walking away from Formula One.
Team by team prospects for the 2016 Formula One season.
Champions Mercedes are chasing a sixth successive double, and Lewis Hamilton his sixth drivers' title, but the task looks tougher than ever.
Hamilton has won half of the season's 20 races so far, propelling his team to an unprecedented sixth successive title double, but Brazil was a disappointing weekend with Valtteri Bottas retiring.
Win in Brazil on Sunday, win the Formula One title: Nico Rosberg's task sounds simple enough but is a lot harder to achieve.
David Coulthard doesn't feel sorry for the multi million pound worth Spaniard.
Formula One championship leader Nico Rosberg's hopes of an eighth successive win, and fifth of the season, disappeared on Sunday after a collision with Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton on the opening lap of the Spanish Grand Prix.
The four times world champion is enjoying his best start to a season since he was at Red Bull in 2011, leading Lewis Hamilton by seven points after two wins and a second place from the first three races.
Lewis Hamilton has had more success in Shanghai than any other Formula One driver, which makes Sunday's Chinese Grand Prix the ideal location for the triple world champion to end Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg's winning streak. While Rosberg has started the season with a perfect 50 points from two races, and a run of five successive victories dating back to last November, Hamilton is ready to turn the tables. The Briton has won four times in Shanghai and is on for three in a row after last season becoming the only driver to win the race in successive years. "It's not been a smooth start to the season for me, so to be in the championship position I'm in right now is actually pretty positive," said Hamilton, who lies second in the standings after a second and a third place. "Now we go to China for the next battle. It's a track that's been good to me over the years... so hopefully this race can be the turning point." Hamilton has not won since he took his third world championship in Austin, Texas, last October but the 31-year-old has started both races this season on pole position.
Silverstone can provide the antidote to Austria for Lewis Hamilton this weekend, with a record sixth British Grand Prix win -- and his fifth in a row -- there for the taking.
Lewis Hamilton's record already bears comparison to Michael Schumacher's, and in some areas exceeds the great German's achievements.
Five-times Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton led a Mercedes front-row lockout with a blistering pole position at the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Saturday.
Lewis Hamilton can set more British Formula One records in Brazil this weekend but it is the world championship he wants and that will have to wait.
Red Bull's Max Verstappen, last year's winner at his team's home circuit, qualified third.
Since the traditional Australian opener was cancelled in March, Formula One has agreed changes to help teams hard hit by COVID-19.
Hamilton already has plenty of records, including 87 pole positions and 33 successive scoring finishes, and his 83 wins put him on course to surpass Schumacher's record tally of 91 next year.
The Briton raised eyebrows on Tuesday when he started an Instagram story, which disappeared after 24 hours, with some cryptic comments.
Former world champion Kimi Raikkonen has renewed his contract with Ferrari and will race for them again next season, the Formula One team said.
Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton won the Hungarian Grand Prix from pole position for Mercedes on Sunday to go into the August break with a 24-point lead over Ferrari rival Sebastian Vettel.
Four-times world champion Sebastian Vettel won the Australian Grand Prix for Ferrari on Sunday to dash Mercedes' hopes of extending their dominance into a fourth successive season of Formula One.
'I'm so grateful for everyone who helped me be here, to raise the bar and lift the cup'
Troubled Indian businessman Vijay Mallya is set to make a rare public appearance in the United Kingdom on Friday when he is scheduled to attend the team bosses press conference ahead of the Formula 1 British Grand Prix.
Max Verstappen won Red Bull's home Austrian Grand Prix on Sunday while Lewis Hamilton suffered his first race retirement since 2016 and lost the Formula One championship lead to Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel.
Lewis Hamilton believes Charles Leclerc has usurped four times world champion team mate Sebastian Vettel as Ferrari's favourite.
Nico Rosberg ended the Formula One season on a winning high in Abu Dhabi on Sunday with team mate and triple world champion Lewis Hamilton following him home in a record 12th one-two finish for dominant Mercedes.
Formula One championship leader Nico Rosberg put Mercedes on pole position for the Bahrain Grand Prix on Saturday and ended team mate Lewis Hamilton's hopes of a hat-trick.
Quadruple world champion Sebastian Vettel continued to set the pace at the U.S. Formula One Grand Prix, topping the final practice time sheets in another Red Bull one-two on Saturday.
Nico Rosberg will have Formula One history in his sights in Spain this weekend, even if Dutch teenager Max Verstappen seizes his share of the limelight. The championship leader has won seven races in a row, including the last three of 2015, and can join fellow-German Michael Schumacher (2004) and Britain's Nigel Mansell (1992) as the only drivers to start a season with five successive victories. The chances of that happening looked remote this time last year, when Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton had won three of the first four and was heading for a third title, but Rosberg is now 43 points clear of the Briton. As 18-year-old Verstappen would agree, after his rapid promotion from Toro Rosso in a swap with demoted Russian Daniil Kvyat, Formula One moves fast off the track as well as on it. "I'm just enjoying the moment and the form I'm in, doing my best to keep it going and hoping I can carry it through to the end of the season," said Rosberg, 11/10 at bookmakers' William Hill with Hamilton at 5/4.
Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel won the Bahrain Grand Prix to go seven points clear at the top of the Formula One standings on Sunday, with Mercedes rival Lewis Hamilton staging a late charge to finish second.
Ferrari's Charles Leclerc qualified third with team mate Sebastian Vettel a distant seventh on a distinctly off day for the German.
Newly-crowned four-times world champion Sebastian Vettel showed no signs of easing up as he led a Red Bull one-two in free practice for the Abu Dhabi Formula One Grand Prix.
World champion Lewis Hamilton topped the timesheets for Mercedes in both practice sessions of the Australian Grand Prix on Friday but team mate Nico Rosberg crashed as waterlogged conditions put a dampener on Formula One's season opener.
Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel put himself on pole position for a fourth successive Formula One title after lapping the Indian Grand Prix circuit faster than any driver ever before on Saturday.
The most successful current racer, in terms of wins if not titles, Hamilton can also equal seven-times world champion Michael Schumacher's all-time record of 68 pole positions at Spa on Saturday.
'Together we achieved outstanding results and in time our record will be recognised on its own merits'
