to hold him up with some brilliant fighting moves in the space of a lap perez cost hamilton seven seconds to cut the gap to just one second at the front and revive verstappen's hopes of winning the race once perez pitted hamilton was again able to stretch out the gap at the front of the field forcing red bull to get creative with this strategy a virtual safety car called for antonio giovannaz's stoppage was the perfect opportunity giving rebel a chance to put verstappen onto a two-stop strategy after pitting him for another set of hard tires snapping rejoined the tracks NUMBER_TOKEN seconds behind hamilton and began to reduce the gap thanks to his fresh tyres but as the laps ticked down verstappen couldn't get any closer than NUMBER_TOKEN seconds to hamilton leaving red bull in need of a miracle but with six laps remaining nicolas tatifi crashed at turn NUMBER_TOKEN to bring out the safety car and offer a final twist that would ultimately help decide the world championship but before we get into the late race drama in abu dhabi we do want to give a shout out to our sponsor for this series party poker who currently have a special sign up offer if you go to the link in the description and open a new account and deposit NUMBER_TOKEN pounds or more today party poker will match you on deposits up to NUMBER_TOKEN pounds and give you NUMBER_TOKEN pounds worth of free play naturally this is only available if you are over NUMBER_TOKEN and teasing c's apply please be gamble aware and play responsibly now back to the action in abu dhabi and with nothing to lose behind the safety car red bull opted to pitch verstappen again for a fresh set of soft tyres mercedes did not bring hamilton in though not wishing to risk giving up track position and keep him in the lead as latifi's car was cleared away it became unclear if the race would resume or finish behind the safety car with three laps to go massey said that lapped cars would not be allowed to unlap themselves leaving a train of five cars between hamilton and verstappen at the front but massey then changed his mind on the penultimate lap and race control confirmed that five cars norris alonso ocon the clerk and vettel could now overtake the safety car with the race returning to green it set up a last lap shootout between hamilton and verstappen for the championship toto wolff told massey over the radio that it isn't right but massey wanted to get the race going again for the final green flag lap of the season with fresh tyres verstappen was able to dive down the inside of the hamilton at turn five to grab the lead sending the dutch fans in the grandstands into wild celebrations hamilton tried to fight back as verstappen weaved to break the toe leaving them side by side into turn nine but verstappen pulled ahead to win the race and with it the NUMBER_TOKEN world championship it was a controversial end that has since seen mercedes lodge protests and notified the fia of its intention to appeal meaning the story isn't over just yet but for verstappen and red bull nothing could dampen their celebrations
START_SPONSOR_TOKEN but before we get into the late race drama in abu dhabi we do want to give a shout out to our sponsor for this series party poker who currently have a special sign up offer if you go to the link in the description and open a new account and deposit NUMBER_TOKEN pounds or more today party poker will match you on deposits up to NUMBER_TOKEN pounds and give you NUMBER_TOKEN pounds worth of free play naturally this is only available if you are over NUMBER_TOKEN and teasing c's apply please be gamble aware and play responsibly now back to the END_SPONSOR_TOKEN