Hamilton wins, Rosberg 2nd
Title goes on to Abu Dhabi; Rosberg leads by 12 points
Race is stopped twice after crashes in heavy rain
Verstappen overtakes several cars brilliantly, and goes from 13th to third in final 16 laps
Grosjean, Ericsson, Raikkonen, Palmer, Massa, Gutierrez out
Image source, .Lewis Hamilton has raced at 25 different grand prix events - and has won at 20 of them.
Brazil is one of the five races to elude him so far, along with the European GP (seven attempts), South Korean (four), Indian (three) and French (two).
Jeremiah Kariuki: Safety car guarantees bit of safety, but it takes away the excitement!
Adam Jones: I've just stuck £5 on Hamilton to win the World Championship. I've never wanted to lose £5 before, until now.
Andrew Priestley: Right Lewis, get yourself into turn one in the lead and hope for some contact and carnage behind you.
Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
Kimi Raikkonen celebrates - if that's the right word in his case - his 250th grand prix this weekend and he has marked it with his best qualifying performance for some time.
Third on the grid puts him as the best of the rest behind Mercedes, and means he has out-qualified team-mate Sebastian Vettel for the last four races and has made it 10-10 in qualifying this year, confirming his resurgence - or perhaps Vettel’s decline in the second half of this season.
Raikkonen described his lap as “pretty average in my view, but it was enough to be third.” Both Ferrari drivers will fancy they have a bit of a chance in the wet.
Image source, Getty Images
Image source, .Should Nico Rosberg win the title today it will have taken him 205 races and 10 years. It would be a record in terms of races taken, although Nigel Mansell would still hold the record for the longest wait in years.
For the record, his father Keke Rosberg took five years and just 51 races to land the biggest prize.
Image source, BBC SportAndrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
The Brazilian Grand Prix paddock is a hotbed of gossip this weekend, especially around the potential movements of senior personnel. As we reported on Friday, Paddy Lowe’s future as Mercedes executive director (technical) is in doubt and some believe the team have lined up former Ferrari technical director James Allison in case he leaves.
Allison has also been linked with McLaren, but that is unlikely to happen, sources say. It looks increasingly likely that another story broken by BBC Sport may come true - that commercial guru Zak Brown will move into a role in the senior management of McLaren, where chairman Ron Dennis’ reign looks to be coming to an end
Ayrton Senna: Tom Clarkson visits F1 driver's grave in Sao Paulo
Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
There has been a bit of a furore this weekend about a phone call Mercedes F1 boss Toto Wolff made to Max Verstappen’s father Jos in the days since the Mexican Grand Prix. Red Bull are furious about what they see as a rival interfering in their business.
The call has been presented by some as Wolff asking Verstappen - and by extension team-mate Daniel Ricciardo - to steer clear of the Mercedes drivers and leave them to battle alone. Wolff categorically denies this and insists it was just a call to an old friend in which he discussed, among many other things, how bad it would be for the Dutchman’s already controversial image, if he was involved in a crash with either of the Mercedes drivers that affected the championship - and Verstappen backs up this explanation of the call.
Both Red Bull drivers have been at pains to emphasise they will race the Mercedes drivers in the same way as always, and the fact the title race is coming to a climax is irrelevant. Verstappen said: “I won't change the approach. The chatting is pretty understandable. As a driver, you always try to do the best job, we should race everyone. Up until the last race, they should still fight for first. For sure, otherwise you're not a worthy world champion, are you?”
Ricciardo added: “You have to race because what’s different now to Melbourne at the start of the year? We’re all racing trying to maximise our position. If it’s like we don’t attack them or go for an opportunity, in a way we’re fixing the championship by not doing that. The championship should be an accumulation of all those races and whatever happens happens. I completely see the respect side of it but it doesn't mean we shouldn't not try to do something if we can.”
Image source, Getty Images
Image source, Getty Images
Image source, Getty Images
Image source, Getty ImagesBen Collins: Have we had one normal race start in the wet this season? Here's hoping the officials keep the race entertaining. #standingstart, external
KsOllieU: I have a feeling Lewis Hamilton won't retire from Brazil GP and Nico Rosberg will win the race. Hope I'm wrong.
Andy Thomas: Rain at the Brazil GP. This could spice things up a bit!
Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
Nico Rosberg’s sizeable championship advantage - 19 points - means he would be the person to benefit in the event of a collision that took both Mercedes drivers out of the race. Titles have been decided in this way before, of course - most notoriously between McLaren team-mates Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna in Japan in 1989, again when Prost was at Ferrari in 1990 and then with Michael Schumacher twice, first with Damon Hill in 1994 and then Jacques Villeneuve in 1997.
In Hamilton’s mind, he lost pole position at Monaco in 2014 to what he believes were Rosberg’s underhand tactics in deliberately going off at Mirabeau so Hamilton could not do his final lap - something Rosberg has always denied.
Was Hamilton worried about any dodgy business? “I don’t go into the race expecting anything less than a fair fight,” he said. “Of course you can look at history and what some drivers have done in the past but I like to think it is not something he would do. I just need to make sure I’m ahead.”
Rosberg said: “We are always free to race; we always have been. There are strict rules of engagement we need to adhere to but apart from that, yeah, go for it.”
Team boss Toto Wolff emphasised: “They know our philosophy in racing and with some minor hiccups we have done OK in the last four years and they didn’t let the team down. This is an exceptional situation with two races to go and the values have not changed. It is in their hands to race in a sporting way.”
Image source, Getty ImagesShould he win today, Nico Rosberg would be second son of an F1 world champion to win the title himself, his father Keke having won in 1982.
The first was Damon Hill in 1996. His father Graham won in 1962 and 1968.
There was a gap of 34 years between Graham Hill's first title and Damon's - exactly the same amount of time that would separate the two Rosbergs.
Image source, Rex Features
Image source, Rex FeaturesAndrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
After qualifying a close second to Lewis Hamilton on Saturday, Nico Rosberg said he had no concerns about a wet race.
He shrugged off comparisons to Monaco this year, when he was woeful and finished an embarrassing seventh, by saying that the last time it rained in Brazil he qualified second and “had a good run”.
If he remembered this year’s British Grand Prix, he did not mention it. There, if you remember, Rosberg lost three seconds to Hamilton in the first nine corners of the race and was passed around the outside at Becketts by Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
Hamilton will be hoping their relative performances are similar here today - and that the rain brings Red Bull into the victory fight, as many - including both Verstappen and Ricciardo - expect it will.
Image source, ReutersSince the Brazilian GP moved to a later date in the calendar it has regularly been the scene of title-deciding race.
Each year marked in red below indicates a season where the title was won at Interlagos.
With that in mind, today we're asking you for your greatest deciders in Brazil. We also have a vote running on this page where you can choose your favourite from the list below:
2005: Alonso’s first title
2006: Alonso second title
2007: Raikkonen pips feuding Hamilton and Alonso
2008: Hamilton nicks it from Massa on the last lap
2009: Button’s bravery seals fairytale
2012: Vettel survives crash to pip Alonso
Image source, BBC SportIt's Felipe Massa's last home GP today before retiring, and the two-time Interlagos winner is understandably emotional at the prospect.
His Williams team has just posted this picture of him wiping away a tear during an interview with Brazilian TV.
I might be needing a tissue myself actually...
Image source, Williams F1Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Sao Paulo
Brazilians call Sao Paulo the ‘city of light rains’ and it is living up to its name on Sunday. A steady persistent rain has fallen throughout the morning and the race looks likely to be the sport of unpredictable damp affair that led to chaotic title deciders in 2008 and 2012.
The only way the championship can be decided today is if Nico Rosberg wins, the likelihood of which one has to say is reduced if the race is wet, judging by the German’s form in such races recently. Lewis Hamilton, meanwhile, needs an unusual, unpredictable race, and a bad afternoon for his team-mate, to get properly back into the fight and go to Abu Dhabi in a winner-takes-all situation. This could just be it.
Image source, APYep, it's wet out there. Proper wet. Wetter than a fish's wet bits. Wetter than a haddock's bathing costume.
Wet.
How exciting.
Image source, F1