Sebastien Vettel finally gets that win as Red Bull show their form at last
Sebastien Vettel took a flawless victory in the Malaysian heat which he essentially won in the first corner after he managed to squeeze Mark Webber and Nico Rosberg out. Mark Webber almost had him at one point but a sticking right front air gun and a blistering out lap from Vettel put pay to that chance.
With the McLarens and the Ferraris out of position it was only Hamilton who really made any impression on the other drivers as carved his way though the field though ultimately he only finished just ahead of Massa and Button. Alonso also deserves a mention for nursing a downshift problem through the whole race distance before his Ferrari engine expired two laps from the end, he was close to taking Button even with his problems that would have meant the car was unpredictable under breaking and unbalanced in some of the slower turn ins.
Adrian Sutil finally got some of the points that he deserved, and he managed to fend off the charging Hamilton on fresher tyres, even with the McLaren’s f-wing – that Force India is quite a good car. Nico Hulkenberg also scored some points keeping the run going for Williams. Jaime Alguersuari also deserves a mention, he scored his first F1 points and put on an impressive display for the race adding some very neat and clinical overtaking to his CV, if he carries on at this rate he will be justifying that F1 drive.
All of the new teams managed to get cars to the finish, they may have been a couple of laps down but that’s no small achievement for Virgin who finished with di Grassi and HRT Cosworth who managed to get both cars to the finish – though Trulli’s car did limp home with hydraulic problems.
Full Result:
1 VETTEL Red Bull
2 WEBBER Red Bull +4.8s
3 ROSBERG Mercedes +13.5s
4 KUBICA Renault +18.5s
5 SUTIL Force India +21.0s
6 HAMILTON McLaren +23.4s
7 MASSA Ferrari +27.0s
8 BUTTON McLaren +37.9s
9 ALGUERSUARI Toro Rosso +70.6s
10 HULKENBERG Williams +73.3s
11 BUEMI Toro Rosso +78.9s
12 BARRICHELLO Williams +1 lap
13 ALONSO Ferrari +2 laps
14 DI GRASSI Virgin +3 laps
15 CHANDHOK HRT +3 laps
16 SENNA HRT +4 laps
17 TRULLI Lotus +5 laps
R KOVALAINEN Lotus +10 laps
R PETROV Renault +24 laps
R LIUZZI Force India +44 laps
R SCHUMACHER Mercedes +47 laps
R KOBAYASHI Sauber +48 laps
R GLOCK Virgin +54 laps
DNS DE LA ROSA Sauber +56 laps
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