 |
| Getty Images |
It was a victory of sorts for both drivers, with Vettel cruising to a lights-to-victory that only briefly - and literally - sparked into anxiety in the faultless frontrunning manner that has become his default setting, while Alonso successfully hunted down Mark Webber to claim second place.
The Ferrari driver never knows when he is beaten, yet, whatever measure of relief his latest successful act of damage limit gives Ferrari, the fact remains that even the brilliant Spaniard has not yet found a way of stemming the awesome Vettel tide. For the reigning World Champion, this amounted to a fourth successive victory - the first time he has recorded such a feat in a single season - and not since Lewis Hamilton's retirement in the Singapore GP over a month ago has any driver led a F1 race lap. He is on the cusp of becoming the new Michael Schumacher.
Hamilton himself only narrowly failed to usurp Webber, suffering from an intermittent KERs failure in the second Red Bull, from the final podium spot in a race that was dominated by tyre management and ended in a degree tension when Vettel's undertray bottomed out along the backstraight. Yet like in Korea, when a performance of domination ended in artificial tension as the Red Bull team cajoled their champion to slow down, there was no disgusing the extent of Red Bull's superiority. They are a class apart and surely only unreliability can now stop Vettel securing a third successive title.
They're also in danger of turning F1 into a procession and it speaks volumes about the bulk of the 60-lap race that, until Alonso and Hamilton caught the faltering Webber, the highlight was the extraordinary achievement of McLaren changing five wheels - four of which were tyres and one for steering - on Hamilton's car in precisely 3.3 seconds.
On the road, the early stages witnessed some of the finest driving of the season as Alonso, Hamilton and Button - who set the fastest lap of the race to deny Vettel the clean sweep - jousted to glorious effect. Side-by-side through half-a-dozen corners, it was first Button, then Hamilton who claimed third position before Alonso decisively ended the battle courtesy of his F2012's superior straight-line speed.
From fifth on the grid, second place represented a brilliant achievement for the Spaniard, an impression underlined by the struggle a rejuvenated Felipe Massa had in becoming a conspicious presence. The Brazilian eventually finished sixth, twenty seconds behind Button and almost thirty adrift of his team-mate.
Further afield, Nico Hulkenberg once again overshadowed Force India team-mate as he claimed seventh place, while Bruno Senna boosted his fragile hopes of retaining a seat on next year's grid by battling to tenth place with a gritty performance that even included an overtake past the sister Williams of Pastor Maldonado.
No comments:
Post a Comment