SEBASTIAN Vettel left everybody else for cold in the heat of a well-lit night-time Singapore grand prix. Only Nico Rosberg briefly drew alongside of him at the start but Vettel soon got past and disappeared into the distance. Within two laps he had a four second lead. Daniel Ricciardo had an accident on lap 24 and this brought out the safety car which closed down his lead temporarily but by lap 31, when the safety car went back into the pits, Vettel immediately pulled away yet again and by the end of the race was more than 30 seconds ahead of Fernando Alonso.
Alonso actually drove a brilliant race and again made up many places at the start, going from seventh to third. Despite giving it his all, the Spaniard could make no impression on the flying German. Kimi Raikkonen also drove a fantastic race for Lotus coming through from 13th on the grid to a final third position on the podium. His teammate was also quick this weekend but unfortunately Romain Grosjean’s engine let him down due to pneumatic valve problems during the race.
Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton, both from Mercedes, had a good battle between each other but try as he might, Hamilton could not get past Rosberg on the day and actually did particularly well to finish fifth after being outside the top 10 in qualifying. Jenson Button was overtaken by Felipe Massa in the closing stages of the race after earlier having been passed by the Mercedes twin. Button was in the unusual situation of running out of good rubber at the end of the race due to incorrect tyre strategy and couldn’t do anything about it.
It was Vettel’s 33rd win and he now has a 60 point lead over his nearest rival Alonso, with Hamilton another 36 points back and Raikkonen in fourth place. In the constructors’ championship, Red Bull is more than 100 points ahead of Ferrari. We now look forward to the Korean grand prix on October 6 after another two week gap.
Race: 1 Sebastian Vettel; 2 Fernando Alonso; 3 Kimi Raikkonen; 4 Nico Rosberg; 5 Lewis Hamilton; 6 Felipe Massa; 7 Jenson Button; 8 Sergio Perez; 9 Nico Hulkenberg; 10 Adrian Sutil.
Drivers’ points: 1 Sebastian Vettel 247; 2 Fernando Alonso 187; 3 Lewis Hamilton 151; 4 Kimi Raikkonen 149; 5 Mark Webber 130; 6 Nico Rosberg 116; 7 Felipe Massa 87; 8 Romain Grosjean 57; 9 Jenson Button 54; 10 Paul di Resta 36.
Constructors’ points: 1 Red Bull 377; 2 Ferrari 274; 3 Mercedes 267; 4 Lotus 206; 5 McLaren 76; 6 Force India 62; 7 Scuderia Toro Rosso 31; 8 Sauber-Ferrari 19; 9 Williams 1.
