Vettel wins fascinating Spanish Grand Prix

Sebastian Vettel has won a fascinating Spanish Grand Prix, leading home the McLarens of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button.

Vettel used precise strategy and withstood immense pressure from Hamilton to secure his fourth win from five races so far this year.

Australian Mark Webber finished fourth.

Vettel’s race was compromised in the fourth and final stint when a problem developed with his KERS and threatened to derail his chances.

The KERS on Vettel’s can appeared to only work periodically.

In the final laps, on a track renowned for its difficulty to pass on, Hamilton made number of attempts to get by Vettel’s handicapped Red Bull into Turn 1. Debris off the racing line ensured that getting past did not happen.

Button finished third after making an awful start and slipping from fifth on the grid to as low as 10th.

An inspired three stop strategy gave Button the edge over Webber and early race leader Fernando Alonso.

Webber finished a quiet fourth ahead, the last of the leading lap runners.

Alonso took fifth after making the best of the start, using the inside dirty side of the circuit to pass Red Bull’s front row sitters.

Alonso’s pace on the hard tyre was poor, though, and couldn’t keep up on home soil.

Mercedes pair Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg finished sixth and seventh from Renault’s Nick Heidfeld and the Sauber duo of Sergio Perez and Kamui Kobayashi.

The DRS and KERS driver aids proved not as effective as they have at other circuits, although compared to past Spanish GP’s at Barcelona, there was more passing.

Enduring a shocker was Felipe Massa. The Ferrari driver never looked in contention, eventually slipping off the road with six laps to go and retiring.

After an impressive qualifying performance (where he put his Lotus into Q2), Heikki Kovalainen crashed at Turn 4 – one of just three DNFs.

Spanish Grand Prix results;

Pos	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid
1	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	66	Winner	2
2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	66	+0.6 secs	3
3	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	66	+35.6 secs	5
4	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	66	+47.9 secs	1
5	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	65	+1 Lap	4
6	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	65	+1 Lap	10
7	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	65	+1 Lap	7
8	Nick Heidfeld	Renault	65	+1 Lap	24
9	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	65	+1 Lap	12
10	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	65	+1 Lap	14
11	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	65	+1 Lap	6
12	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	65	+1 Lap	16
13	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	65	+1 Lap	17
14	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	65	+1 Lap	11
15	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Cosworth	65	+1 Lap	9
16	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	64	+2 Laps	13
17	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	64	+2 Laps	19
18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Renault	64	+2 Laps	18
19	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	63	+3 Laps	20
20	Jerome d’Ambrosio	Virgin-Cosworth	62	+4 Laps	23
21	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT-Cosworth	61	+5 Laps	22
Ret	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	58	+8 Laps	8
Ret	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Renault	48	Accident	15
Ret	Vitantonio Liuzzi	HRT-Cosworth	28	+38 Laps	21

 

World Championship points;

 

Pos	Driver	Team	Points
1	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	118
2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	77
3	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	67
4	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	61
5	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	51
6	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	26
7	Nick Heidfeld	Renault	25
8	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	24
9	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	21
10	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	14
11	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	9
12	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	6
13	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	2
14	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	2
15	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	2
16	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	0
17	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	0
18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Renault	0
19	Jerome d’Ambrosio	Virgin-Cosworth	0
20	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Renault	0
21	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Cosworth	0
22	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	0
23	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT-Cosworth	0
24	Vitantonio Liuzzi	HRT-Cosworth	0