The Day After: Hamilton Ends on a High Note

If there's such a notion as too much of a good thing, apparently that message has failed to reach Lewis Hamilton.

Recording his eleventh win of the season on Sunday in Abu Dhabi, Hamilton ensured he finished the year with one final reminder to his rivals: that he's the boss for the foreseeable future.

A race that was a bit like his season, you could've been forgiven for wondering during the race whether someone else might pull off the upset, but in the end, the only question left was, "was there ever really a doubt?"

Sebastian Vettel tried, Max Verstappen tried, even Daniel Ricciardo looked like an outside chance. In the end their efforts didn't matter, as it was evident that even with Vettel 2.5s behind, Hamilton had them all within hand.

Interestingly, the only man who never seemed a threat was his teammate, Valtteri Bottas. The Finn could hardly have picked a worse time to have the worst drive of his Mercedes career, and now enters the winter break winless in 2018 and the questions only set to get louder about his future with the team.

Still, that's for later. The now belongs to Hamilton. Again. Hats off to him. Maybe he didn't have anything to prove, but it still has to be nice to have broken his post-championship duck in the last two races, but particularly here where there was no "divine" intervention. Now he gets to enjoy a few months break, and then, probably do it all again next year.

Just when you thought the FIA had weathered the brunt of the criticism over the halo, over goes Nico Hulkenberg, and now we have a controversy again, with Charlie Whiting forced to defend the device after Hulkenberg alleged it impeded his escape. Whoever's right, the incident highlighted that the halo still poses an obstacle in the event of a fire, and that's an issue Whiting and co

must resolve.

It may have been the right move strategically, but seeing Max Verstappen pass him in the pits would've been a tough pill to swallow for Daniel Ricciardo. The Dutchman has largely had the measure of him all season, and losing possibly his last opportunity to finish ahead of him for a while has to be at least a little frustrating.

I'm not sure what FOM's obsession with Will Smith is, but to be fair, his pre-race skit with Lewis Hamilton was very funny.

Charles Leclerc: A superb start saw him jump Daniel Ricciardo and even run as high as P4 at one point, before two safety cars and an ill-timed pitstop relegated him to P13, from which he still managed to fight back to seventh. I can't wait to see what this kid can do in a Ferrari.

Fernando Alonso: Just an expert troll job by the Spaniard in his final race, cutting the corner on three consecutive laps to try and close on P10 Kevin Magnussen. I'm sure he'll really notice the penalty points on his licence.

Renault pit wall: "Are you okay, Nico?"