An extraordinary race ended with victory for Fernando Alonso, delirium in the Spanish grandstands, and bewilderment at how one race, expected to be a bore, could pack so much drama.
What started as a procession for Sebastian Vettel ended in bedlam as Pastor Maldonado rammed Lewis Hamilton off the track, Michael Schumacher inherited the first podium of his second life in F1, Kimi Raikkonen was classified as finishing second after the stewards somehow failed to notice the Lotus overtaking a Toro Rosso under double yellow flags, and Alonso endorsed a reputation that lists the Spaniard as the finest driver in motorsport.
For Alonso, tears of jubilation. For Hamilton and Vettel, angry fist-pumps. For everyone else, bewilderment at what had just unfolded.
For starters, there was the most unexpected of questions to answer: Just how had Alonso achieved the seemingly impossible in securing victory after starting eleventh on the grid at a circuit infamous for its lack of interest in overtaking?
Good fortunate played a favourable hand, of course. How could it be argued that it didn't when Vettel was forced to retire from the lead of a race he had dominated, technical gremlins also did for Romain Grosjean when the Frenchman was well set to claim his maiden F1 victory, and the now all-too familiar McLaren pit-stop calamity allowed Alonso to nip ahead of his World Championship rival? Yet above all else, this was a victory which owed its largest debt not to fortune but the genius and bravery of Alonso.
Yet while the race ended as a breathtaking classic, the irony is that for a vast swathe it appeared as if 2011 was returning with a vengeance as Vettel disappeared into a race of his own, pulling away at a rate of a second per lap all the way through to his first pit-stop.
The first proverbial spanner thrown into the works was the deployment of the Safety Car after the wretched Jean-Eric Vergne had inexplicably rammed the Caterham of Heikki Kovalainen - misbehaviour which will see the Frenchman suffer a five grid-slot demotion in Silverstone - and set in motion a train of events that ended with Alonso securing the most dramatic victory of his career and, in the process, a sudden 20-point lead in the World Championship.
Having had to wait six years to win on home Spanish soil for the second time in F1 the usually controlled Alonso was clearly overwhelmed: "Really difficult to express in words what is the feeling at the moment," Alonso said.
"Winning the home Grand Prix is something unique, a very special feeling. I had the opportunity [to do it] in Barcelona 2006 with Renault and I still remember that day perfectly and now did the same here in Valencia with this special team, Ferrari.
"Winning in Spain this race is probably the best victory I ever felt, or in terms of emotions, nothing maybe compares to this one."
Alonso's surge to 11th from first was only party of the story, though. Within a lap of the race being resumed, the Red Bull suddenly crawled to a halt, seemingly without warning, promoting Alonso into the lead after the Ferrari superstar had muscled his way around Grosjean on the restart. Barely had that shock been absorbed, and a distraught Vettel been spotted slapping his gloves against a walls, than Grosjean also succumbed to unreliability, leaving Hamilton in second, closely followed by Raikkonen, and the grandstands in a state of delirium.
Whatever next? First, the peculiarity of Hamilton being investigated for an offence that Raikkonen had clearly committed. Then, just when it seemed as if the McLaren was poised to make a late push for victory, Hamilton flat-spotted a tyre, resulting in a loss of position to the Finn and then, spectacularly, the loss of a points-paying finish as Maldonado rammed him into the barriers.
Cue the Englishman punching his steering-wheel and yet more celebrations in the grandstands amid the realisation that Alonso had somehow plundered 25 points on his chief World Champion rivals having started five grid-rows behind both Vettel and Hamilton. 2012 truly is the year of the unpredictable.
And there was one more sting in the tale still to be told. With Maldonado's Williams losing its nose whilst ramming the side of Hamilton's stricken McLaren, it fell to Schumacher to inherit another position. But which? The German had no idea.
"As I crossed the line, I asked the guys 'where have I finished?'" he recounted in the post-race conference.
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