Vettel leads home Alonso in Indian Grand Prix

Sebastian Vettel has narrowly extended his advantage in the 2012 Formula 1 World Championship by leading home Fernando Alonso in the Indian Grand Prix.

Vettel out-foxed fellow front-row starter and team-mate Mark Webber on the run to the first corner and was not headed for the entire 60 lap journey.

The win is the German’s fourth in succession and sees his lead over Alonso out to 13 points with just three races remaining.

Starting from fifth on the grid, Alonso made swift work of the two McLarens, carving his way by Lewis Hamilton on the opening lap before making a move on Jenson Button as soon as the DRS became available.

The Ferrari driver then set off after Webber, eventually taking the second Red Bull, which by now was without a working KERS system, with 10 laps remaining.

Alonso eventually took the flag 9.2s behind Vettel, whose Red Bull made it to the finish largely unperturbed by sparks being emitted from a dragging floor in the closing laps.

Hamilton shadowed Webber across the line in fourth, while team-mate Button could manage no better than fifth after losing time behind a off-sequence Romain Grosjean midrace.

The Frenchman had completed a long first stint on the prime tyre as part of his one-stop strategy and eventually finished ninth behind his seventh placed team-mate Kimi Raikkonen and the Force India of Nico Hulkenberg.

Bruno Senna secured the last point for Williams after overcoming Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes in the closing stages.

Their respective team-mates Pastor Maldonado and Michael Schumacher both fell foul of contact-induced punctures, with the German’s occurring on the very first lap.

Sergio Perez also suffered a contact-induced puncture and was forced to retire from the resulting damage.

Pedro de la Rosa was the race’s only other retirement, with an apparent front-brake failure pitching the HRT driver into the barriers.

The Formula 1 World Championship continues next weekend in Abu Dhabi.

See below for the full race result

Pos	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid
1	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull Racing-Renault	60	Winner	1
2	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	60	+9.4 secs	5
3	Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing-Renault	60	+13.2 secs	2
4	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	60	+13.9 secs	3
5	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	60	+26.2 secs	4
6	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	60	+44.6 secs	6
7	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus-Renault	60	+45.2 secs	7
8	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India-Mercedes	60	+54.9 secs	12
9	Romain Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	60	+56.1 secs	11
10	Bruno Senna	Williams-Renault	60	+74.9 secs	13
11	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	60	+81.6 secs	10
12	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	60	+82.8 secs	16
13	Daniel Ricciardo	STR-Ferrari	60	+86.0 secs	15
14	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	60	+86.4 secs	17
15	Jean-Eric Vergne	STR-Ferrari	59	+1 Lap	18
16	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Renault	59	+1 Lap	9
17	Vitaly Petrov	Caterham-Renault	59	+1 Lap	19
18	Heikki Kovalainen	Caterham-Renault	59	+1 Lap	20
19	Charles Pic	Marussia-Cosworth	59	+1 Lap	24
20	Timo Glock	Marussia-Cosworth	58	+2 Laps	21
21	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT-Cosworth	58	+2 Laps	23
22	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	55	+5 Laps	14
Ret	Pedro de la Rosa	HRT-Cosworth	42	Brakes	22
Ret	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	20	+40 Laps	8

See below for the full race result

Pos	Driver	Points
1	Sebastian Vettel	240
2	Fernando Alonso	227
3	Kimi Räikkönen	173
4	Mark Webber	167
5	Lewis Hamilton	165
6	Jenson Button	141
7	Nico Rosberg	93
8	Romain Grosjean	90
9	Felipe Massa	89
10	Sergio Perez	66
11	Kamui Kobayashi	50
12	Nico Hulkenberg	49
13	Paul di Resta	44
14	Michael Schumacher	43
15	Pastor Maldonado	33
16	Bruno Senna	26
17	Jean-Eric Vergne	12
18	Daniel Ricciardo	9
19	Timo Glock	0
20	Heikki Kovalainen	0
21	Vitaly Petrov	0
22	Jerome D’Ambrosio	0
23	Charles Pic	0
24	Narain Karthikeyan	0
25	Pedro de la Rosa	0