Just tried to stay out of trouble: Hamilton

The Mercedes driver clinched his 100th race win by emerging the winner in the Russian Grand Prix

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton notched up his 100th win Formula 1 racing in the Russian Grand Prix and regained the championship lead.

"Wow... 100! Its taken a long time and I wasn't even sure the 100th would come! Going to bed last night I wasn't the happiest with the job I did in qualifying. I watched the replay over and over again; they were subtle mistakes but I was so determined to put things right when I woke up this morning," he said.

“Today was tough. I lost a lot of ground at the start, just trying to stay out of trouble. I was patient and at the end, when the rain came, I didn't want to let Lando go by boxing. Of course, I didn't know what the rain was doing, it was just my feeling but I'm incredibly grateful to the strategy team for the job they did today. Getting anywhere near 100 victories wouldn't be possible without the hard work of the men and women here and back at the factory, I'm so grateful to them, it just feels so special," the seven-time world champion added.

“Lando did an amazing job, he had incredible pace and he's doing such a great job for McLaren. It was bittersweet to see my old team ahead, they're doing so well powered by Mercedes and it's good to see them united again. Max did a good job to come up from second to last, the battle continues and we know we need to be on top form over the remaining races,” he felt.

Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen finished second, while Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz came in third.

Verstappen said: “Wow, we will definitely take that result! Of course, to come from last to second is very good and when I woke up this morning I definitely didn’t expect this result. To finish where we did with the penalty we had, we didn’t lose as many points as we could have so as a team we did a really good job.

“It was a crucial call to change to the intermediate tyres, it was really slippery on track and we made a great decision with the timing and took the right lap to pit. A lot of things can happen when you’re starting from the back of the grid, especially on the first lap when other cars are fighting each other, but we stayed out of trouble, kept it clean, and managed our race very well. The race itself was not very easy, it was difficult to pass other cars and once you got stuck it was easy to damage your tyres but luckily in the end the rain helped us make the last jump in positions,” he added.

Mercedes driver Hamilton leads with 246.5 points, while Verstappen has 244.5 points. Valtteri Bottas has 151 points and McLaren;s Lando Norris has 139 points.