Daniel Ricciardo beat pole-sitter Nico Rosberg into the first corner for the lead. Behind the pair Sebastian Vettel collided with his teammate Kimi Räikkönen while trying to avoid Red Bull Racing's Daniil Kvyat (Vettel would subsequently dub Kvyat "The Torpedo" for his role in the incident). Both Ferraris were able to continue the race. Further down the pack Romain Grosjean picked up some damage as well, while Lewis Hamilton collided with Felipe Nasr and got his front wing caught under his car. Räikkönen, Grosjean, Hamilton and Nasr all made a pit-stop at the end of the first lap. Ricciardo kept the lead until his left-rear tyre failed during lap 3 on the long straight between turns 13 and 14. Rosberg overtook him and he swiftly went to the pit lane for a new set of tyres, dropping him down the field. One lap later the Safety Car was deployed to allow the stewards to clear debris from the track. Kvyat, Pérez, Vettel, Hülkenberg, Sainz, Button, Bottas, Verstappen, Ericsson and Magnussen all elected to make a pit-stop during this safety car period to pick up fresh tyres. Vettel had his damaged front wing changed as well. Rosberg elected to stay out, however. Hamilton came to the pit lane as well, but returned just one lap later to change his set of red-banded supersoft tyres for a set of yellow-banded soft ones.
