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REACTION FROM BOTTAS AND VERSTAPPEN HERE: AND THAT WILL BE ALL FROM ME. It wasn't a perfect day for Hamilton, by any stretch of the imagination, but a podium finish wasn't the

worst result either having given up a 10-second penalty before the race even began. Bottas will be buoyed by his victory, Verstappen was happy with second in his Red Bull, and Ferrari show

some signs of recovery with a handy sixth place for Leclerc. Congratulations to Kimi Raikkonen, by the way, for equalling Rubens Barichello's record of 322 F1 Grand Prix starts. As for

Hamilton's pursuit of Michael Schumacher's record of 91 Grand Prix wins, that will have to wait for another day. Thanks for reading and goodbye. CONSTRUCTOR'S CHAMPIONSHIP -

LATEST STANDINGS AFTER THE RUSSIAN GP: 1 MERCEDES 366 2 RED BULL RACING HONDA 192 3 MCLAREN RENAULT 106 4 RACING POINT BWT MERCEDES 104 5 RENAULT 99 6 FERRARI 74 7 ALPHATAURI HONDA 59 8 ALFA

ROMEO RACING FERRARI 4 9 HAAS FERRARI 1 10 WILLIAMS MERCEDES 0 LATEST DRIVERS' STANDINGS - TOP 10: 1 Lewis Hamilton MERCEDES 205 2 Valtteri Bottas MERCEDES 161 3 Max Verstappen RED

BULL RACING HONDA 128 4 Lando Norris MCLAREN RENAULT 65 5 Alexander Albon RED BULL RACING HONDA 64 6 Daniel Ricciardo RENAULT 63 7 Charles Leclerc FERRARI 57 8 Lance Stroll RACING POINT BWT

MERCEDES 57 9 Sergio Perez RACING POINT BWT MERCEDES 56 10 Pierre Gasly FRA ALPHATAURI HONDA 45 CHARLES LECLERC IS HAPPY but it is safe to say that Lance Stroll of Racing Point is not, after

the two drivers had a coming together on the first lap: "Very sloppy from his part and I gave him all the room," Stroll says of Leclerc in a story on the F1 website.

"I'm quite surprised that he didn't get a penalty. I gave him plenty of room I did the whole corner on the outside and he just tagged my right rear. "I gave him all the

room I could and it was unlucky but he could have avoided it. He didn't have to run so wide into me, so I think it's kind of ridiculous that he didn't get a penalty," he

added. SUZI EMAILS: "Bottas can sling all the barbs he wants at the critics but the truth is this win is purely down to those penalties. Of course it was Lewis's errors that led to

those penalties but I also don't get why such a drilled driver and team are making the most basic of errors after all these years." CHARLES LECLERC OF FERRARI SPEAKS TO SKY

SPORTS: "I was surprised. On Friday I did quite a bad job in the car ... P6 was definitely the best we could do today ... I'm very happy. We are coming back from very, very

difficult weekends ... finally to have a race where we can see positive signs from the car, and also from myself ... I'm happy. We need to do the same until the end of the season."

TO SAY HAMILTON is unhappy would be an understatement. He flatly refused to explain the circumstances surrounding the events that led to his 10-second time penalty. The post-race

conversations he has with the team will be interesting to say the least - was it driver error, or was there some fault with the team? REGARDING THE POST-RACE INTERVIEWS, I understand that

Formula 1 tracks are noisy places, but could they not find somewhere a tiny bit quieter to do them? They can barely hear each other. "CONFIRMATION THERE", as some commentators

might say - PETER NUTKINS, thank you very much for emailing this, following Nicholas Butler's earlier email about the points system: "Under the old 9-6-5-4-3-2-1 points, including

today's results, the table would be: HAM 70 BOT 54 VER 43 NOR 18 RIC 18 ALB 17 LEC 17 STR 16 PER 16 GAS 11 SAI 11 OCO 6 VET 3 HUL 1 KYV 1" RACE WINNER BOTTAS SPEAKS - firstly,

about his attempt to get around his teammate Hamilton at turn two: "Obviously I tried ... it was the first opportunity ... but it was a bit compromised because THERE WAS A MASSIVE BEE

OR SOMETHING THAT HIT MY VISOR, so I couldn't really see where I should break, and I went too deep. But I knew it was going to be a long race after that ... Lewis had a penalty, and

once I had clean air, the pace was really awesome and I felt like I could control everything. Never give up. It's nice to get a win again, it's been a while, I need to try and keep

the momentum. There are quite a few races to go and I'll keep pushing." "He will get quite a buzz out of this weekend," says commentator Ted Kravitz. Booooo! I thought

his post-race comments on the radio were quite waspish. RACE REPORT - HERE! LEWIS HAMILTON SPEAKS: "First I want to say a big thank you to all the fans that came this weekend." He

is not interested in discussing his penalty, though: "It doesn't matter, it's done now, I'll take the points that I got and move on." Johnny Herbert asks: "It

was a great comeback from you in the race, though?" "Not particularly, I didn't really do much. I just held my position. But congratulations to Valtteri." Herbert:

"OK, I know you are disappointed." End of interview. THE TOP 10: VERSTAPPEN OF RED BULL, who finished second, speaks: "We were a little bit slower on the medium tyre, once we

went on to the hard tyre, we were more competitive. To be able to split the Mercedes again, we can be pretty pleased with that. I was just trying to do my own race, they are faster ... but I

did everything I could. I'm very happy with second." FIST BUMPS ALL ROUND for Bottas and his team. Meanwhile, Jack Richardson emails in: "What's the point of watching F1

when its clear Hamilton is going to be loaded with penalties. He might as well be given a caravan to tow round, it's a joke." Personally I reckon Hamilton made a pretty basic

error, or two, and a 10-second penalty seemed fair enough. What do you guys think?? LAP 53/53: The victorious Bottas speaks on the radio: "It's a nice moment to thank my critics

... to whom it may concern: Fuck you." Did you hear that, Bottas critics of the world?? It's glory for the Finnish driver in Sochi. It was an off-day for his teammate Hamilton, but

Bottas finishes it off! Verstappen is second, Hamilton is third. It looked as if Hamilton was going for a fastest lap on his final lap, but then he seemed to ease off. LAP 52/53: Email from

Jim! "Do you think that we are putting too much pressure on Verstappen to always get a good result more so than the other young drivers, which we just accept their result, but hope

they will do better?" Jim - yes, seems like a fair point. Verstappen is always being judged against the consistent excellence of Hamilton. LAP 51/53: Bottas is closing in on victory. On

commentary, they are wondering if this could be the start of a concerted challenge from Bottas for the drivers' title - or is it just one bad day for Hamilton? Verstappen is still more

than seven seconds down on Bottas, our leader, with Hamilton another 10 seconds behind that. _Trivia: _This is Sebastian Vettel's 250th race start. LAP 50/53: Nicholas Butler emails:

"Hi Luke - As I saw you list the current points standings I idly wondered whether or not anyone has done an analysis of whether the champion would have been different in any season if

the classic old 9-6-5-4-3-2-1 (and then 10-6-5-4-3-2-1 I think) scoring systems had been retaining rather than using the current scoring system?" Nick, I have no idea, to be honest.

Anyone else? Thanks for the email! LAP 49/53: Bottas of Mercedes remains on course for a comfortable win. He is more than seven seconds ahead of Verstappen so only has four laps to

negotiate. LAP 47/53: Gasly tries to get past Norris! Norris slams the door! Great racing in the battle for ninth ... just a bit of a shame there isn't more action up at the front of

the race. Now Gasly, the man who won the Italian Grand Prix earlier this month, gets around his man and into ninth. LAP 46/53: The top 10 in the drivers standings going into this one: Lewis

Hamilton 190 Valtteri Bottas 135 Max Verstappen 110 Lando Norris 65 Alexander Albon 63 Lance Stroll 57 Daniel Ricciardo 53 Charles Leclerc 49 Sergio Perez 44 Pierre Gasly 43 Meanwhile,

Norris, Gasly and Albon are having an entertaining battle for ninth place. * LAP 43/53: We just had a 'virtual safety car' while track marshalls replace the bollards at turn two. I

say bollards, they look like they are made of polystyrene. The fact I have time to type this shows there isn't a huge amount of excitement on track right now, certainly not in the top

placings, where Bottas is speeding to victory. * LAP 42/53: Get in touch! Email me or tweet @LukeMcLaughlin with your thoughts. If you want to. * LAP 39/53: The race leader Bottas has more

than 11 seconds on his closest rival, Verstappen, as we see a spectacular overhead shot of the Sochi track bathed in sunshine. It is fair to say that this race has settled down after a very

exciting opening. Even before the race was an exciting time, as we awaited news of Hamilton's punishment for those practice starts outside the designated area. The answer was that

Hamilton was docked 10 seconds, and he is currently 9.3 seconds behind Verstappen and about 20 seconds behind Bottas. LAP 38/53: Five-second penalty banter from Ricciardo: LAP 37/53:

Raikkonen pits, and his team make a hash of it. They lose a few precious seconds and Raikkonen drops down to 16th. Bottas continues his serene progress up front. LAP 34/53: THE TOP 10 - 1

Valtteri BOTTAS Mercedes LEADER 1 2 Max VERSTAPPEN Red Bull Racing +12.853 1 3 Lewis HAMILTON Mercedes +22.743 1 4 Sergio PEREZ Racing Point +28.943 1 5 Daniel RICCIARDO Renault +39.734 1 6

Charles LECLERC Ferrari +43.078 1 7 Esteban OCON Renault +48.418 1 8 Daniil KVYAT AlphaTauri +49.730 1 9 Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN Alfa Romeo Racing +57.530 1 10 Pierre GASLY AlphaTauri +57.871 1 And

as I post that, Gasly gets past Raikkonen, and is ninth. Remember - Raikkonen is making history today, this being his 322nd Grand Prix start, equalling Rubens Barichello's record. LAP

31/53: Vettel pits! And rejoins in 15th place. Up front, Bottas leads, with Verstappen in second and Hamilton now third. Hamilton is more than 21 seconds down on his teammate Bottas, and

Bottas is going to be able to race until the end. He is also 12.5sec ahead of Verstappen in second. So barring disasters, Bottas wins. LAP 30/53: As they stand, with 23 laps to go. The 1

denotes one pitstop, or indeed 2 in the case of Albon and Russell. 1 Valtteri BOTTAS Mercedes LEADER 1 2 Max VERSTAPPEN Red Bull Racing +12.197 1 3 Daniil KVYAT AlphaTauri +18.447 1 4 Lewis

HAMILTON Mercedes +19.091 1 5 Sergio PEREZ Racing Point +23.996 1 6 Daniel RICCIARDO Renault +35.577 1 7 Charles LECLERC Ferrari +37.783 1 8 Esteban OCON Renault +39.764 1 9 Sebastian VETTEL

Ferrari +42.659 1 10 Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN Alfa Romeo Racing +44.207 1 11 Pierre GASLY AlphaTauri +45.321 1 12 Lando NORRIS McLaren +48.586 1 13 Kevin MAGNUSSEN Haas F1 Team +51.814 1 14 Romain

GROSJEAN Haas F1 Team +55.056 1 15 Antonio GIOVINAZZI Alfa Romeo Racing +56.809 1 16 Alexander ALBON Red Bull Racing +67.870 2 17 Nicholas LATIFI Williams +73.639 1 18 George RUSSELL

Williams +77.734 2 19 Carlos SAINZ McLaren 20 Lance STROLL Racing Point LAP 29/53: Leclerc of Ferrari pits! He comes back out on track in seventh place. LAP 27/53: Bottas pits! And he comes

out still in first place. He will be able to make it to the end of the race on these tyres. Meanwhile, Daniel Ricciardo (Renault) is under investigation by the race stewards for failing to

follow instructions. And he gets a five-second penalty. LAP 26/53: Verstappen pits for the first time in his Red Bull, and comes out ahead of Hamilton. So Daniil Kvyat moves into third place

on the road.