Top Stories of 2017, #3: Hamilton wins title amid Ferrari meltdown

Few would have bet against Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes having another dominant season in 2017 given how the previous year (and years) had gone.

The British driver may have lost the 2016 championship battle to now-retired teammate Nico Rosberg, but the German squad was again in a league apart. Red Bull was its main threat with an underpowered car, and Ferrari failed to even win a race all year.

Hamilton may have been unable to get revenge on Rosberg after the German announced his shock retirement from the sport just days after winning the title, but the then three-time world champion appeared more fired up than ever to get the fourth crown he felt should have been his in 2016.

A determined Hamilton with a new teammate in Valtteri Bottas, an impressive-looking new car, and an improved engine left everybody feeling 2017 would be a cakewalk for the Briton.

However, Ferrari's decision to give up on 2016 early to focus on fighting back this year paid off early on, as the Italian team already looked like a real contender in pre-season testing.

Despite Hamilton grabbing a rather comfortable pole position in the season-opening race in Australia, it was Sebastian Vettel who went on to win the race - and on merit - to show the the Maranello outfit finally had a car to match the Mercedes.

Hamilton fought back in the second race of the year in China, but Vettel victories in Bahrain and Monaco were proof that Ferrari was a real championship contender and that Mercedes had a fight on its hands for the first time in a long while.

After Vettel's win in Monaco, Hamilton took victory in Canada before the championship headed to Azerbaijan, where one of the highlights of the year would take place as the Ferrari racer drove into his Mercedes rival after feeling he had been brake-tested.

It was evidence, if nothing else, that Vettel knew this year was a golden chance to end Mercedes' dominance and that it would take everything he had to make it happen.

After Bottas won in Austria, Hamilton was back on the top step of the podium in Britain, where Vettel could only manage seventh place to see the championship lead he had retained since the start of the year being reduced to just one point.

Then came Hungary, where Vettel - struggling with a car that wasn't working 100 percent - scored an unlikely win (mainly courtesy of Kimi Raikkonen), as Hamilton settled for fourth position, having given up a podium slot to Bottas after the Finn had let him through in order to try to pass Raikkonen.

As it turned out, the Hungaroring weekend was the turning point of the season. It was after the summer break when Hamilton's stepped his game up a notch and, perhaps more importantly, Mercedes started to show it continued to hold the upper hand in the development race.

Hamilton went on to take consecutive wins in Belgium, Italy and Singapore, in the process moving to the top of the standings for the first time.

He was second to Verstappen in Malaysia, but won again in Japan and the US as Vettel's championship challenge faded quickly thanks to a series of reliability problems and the infamous Singapore GP crash.

Six races after his win in Hungary, Vettel's hopes were all but gone, with Hamilton cruising to his fourth title, which he clinched, ironically, with a ninth-place finish in the Mexican Grand Prix.

Vettel ended his miserable winless run in Brazil, where he took his fifth and final win of a year that had promised so much early on but that ended in yet more disappointment for Ferrari.

For Hamilton and Mercedes, it was another glorious year that cemented their position as the dominant force in the hybrid era of grand prix racing. The question now is who stops them in 2018...

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