Three tales from the Azerbaijan Grand Prix

BAKU: Three storylines from Sunday's (Jun 12) Azerbaijan Grand Prix:

The sight of a seven-time world champion in the prime of his life wincing from back pain and grabbing onto a helping elbow as he gingerly got out of his car at the end of Sunday's race will live long in the memory.

Lewis Hamilton had warned Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff before lights out that there was a danger his car's bouncing, which returned with a vengeance on the streets of Baku, might force him into an early retirement. But drawing on reserves of the professionalism and drive and obstinacy he's called on to overcome any adversity blocking his journey through Formula One he stuck it out to the bitter end. His reward was fourth behind teammate George Russell and the dominant Red Bull duo.

With a dozen more points in the bank he approaches another tricky weekend of street fighting in Montreal with a grand total of 62 to leave him sixth in the Max Verstappen-led drivers' table, with his teammate on 99 in fourth. Wolff apologised to Hamilton over the team radio. "This is a bit of a box to drive. And sorry for the back problems". 

Despite Russell last week urging the FIA to rethink the radical new designs for the cars that some teams have done better with than others it's clear F1's so-called "porpoising" generation isn't going anywhere fast, a bit like the car Hamilton had so much trouble extricating himself from. "There are no holy cows, everything is being looked at and we've got a great team trying to solve our issues," said Wolff.

Hamilton and Mercedes can at least take comfort from one of the curious aspects of a season now a third of the way through - that his tally of 34 points from the last five races since Australia in a struggling machine is