Celebrate good times… (unless you luck into a win)

Perhaps the most exciting part of the weekend, apart from Max Verstappen going wheel-to-wheel with Pastor Maldonado at Monaco, was the decision by Mercedes to pit Lewis Hamilton under the safety car.

Or maybe it was the social media reaction afterwards.

One of the main criticisms of race winner Nico Rosberg was the fact he had the audacity to celebrate the win.

Yes, you read that correctly. Rosberg celebrated the win. And he got abuse for it, that it was disrespectful to celebrate in front of his downbeat teammate.

Was it disrespectful? Simply put, no.

He had just won a race, he had every right to celebrate. He had also just won Monaco for the third consecutive time, joining a very exclusive club.

Regardless of how he won the race, Rosberg had won. A driver may prefer to win in dominant fashion, as Hamilton should have done, but let’s be honest: if they won a race on the final corner of the final lap, they would not care.

They would have just won a race.

To take a football analogy, in 2013 Manchester City and Manchester United went head-to-head with each other for the Premier League title. United had it won in the 90^th minute, having won their game 1-0 and City being 2-1 down. Come the 94^th minute, City had won 3-2 and won the title with the final kick of the game. They celebrated.

Now, obviously a race win is not quite the same as winning the league or championship (although Hamilton did win the championship on the final corner of the final lap of the final race and celebrated. Was that disrespectful to Felipe Massa?). But the point is the same: you will always celebrate a win.

To say a driver should not celebrate an inherited win is ridiculous; many drivers inherit a win. In Turkey 2010, the Red Bulls of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber came together. Did Hamilton celebrate his inherited race win? Yes.

There are numerous occasions that involve a driver winning through luck, which means drivers have lost wins through luck. Sometimes you get lucky in F1, sometimes you do not.

Hamilton was quicker all weekend, something Rosberg acknowledged. He also acknowledged that he got lucky in halving his championship deficit to his teammate.

What else is he supposed to do? Pull over and let Hamilton (and Vettel) through? Of course not.

He had every right to celebrate, as Hamilton would have done if the situation had been reversed.