Yet again Sebastian Vettel started from the pole but also yet again he was punished by the Red bulls reliability issues after his car snapped out under heavy braking. Only a few laps before that he had radioed to the pit wall complaining about heavy vibration under braking, the German paid the ultimate price.
Mclarens Jenson Button surprisingly managed to take the win after many changes in the lead. The race started off in the wet as every driver opted for the intermediate tires. It looked like it would be an action packed race and I wasn’t dissapointed.
Sebastian Vettel took the lead from the go with Ferrari’s Felipe Massa sling-shoting himself into 2nd place.
The reigning world champion Jenson Button’s bold early switch to dry tyres in a race that began damp put him in position to inherit the lead when a brake failure pitched Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull) into the gravel and out of a race he had controlled easily from the start. Renault’s Robert Kubica finished in a superb second place withstanding pressure from Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso’s Ferrari’s and Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes. Lewis Hamilton and Mark Webber were also part of this battle and looked set to battle Alonso for fourth but that was before Webber took Hamilton out in a rear-end shunt.
Michael Schumacher’s race was basically over in turn 1 as he collided with the slow starting Alonso whose car was sent flying into the side of the Mercedes, Resulting in a broken front wing for Schumacher. Alonso made a great comeback from all the way at the back of the field and yet he managed to finish an incredible 4th.
Also on the first lap Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi crashed heavily into Nico Hulkenberg’s Williams and Sebastian Buemi’s prompting a safety car period.
The McLarens had ended up sixth and seventh once the first corner mess unfolded, with Button in front until Hamilton dived past him into Turn 3 on lap six. Button then decided the track was ready for slicks and pitted. This looked to be a bad move as he went through the gravel at Turn 3. But once he passed the second and third sector it was clear this option was the way to go. The rest of the drivers soon followed also changing to slick tires. Although the two Red Bulls stayed out expecting more rain within the next few laps. But this didn’t happen forcing them to change to slicks also.
Vettel was denied a near-certain victory, following his brake failure as at the time he was over 5 seconds ahead of Button and gaining more ground with every lap. Button found himself in the lead by 6 seconds over Kubica, who soon had Hamilton all over the back of him, while behind them Webber made it past Massa with an outside line move at Turn 3. Alonso, however, would not get past his team-mate so easily, remaining trapped behind Massa for lap after lap.
With eight laps to go, Kubica, Massa, Alonso, Hamilton and Webber were nose to tail in second to sixth places, with Rosberg gaining on the queue as well. Hamilton’s tyres went off again in the Ferraris’ dirty air, but he still got alongside Alonso into Turn 13 two laps from the end. As Alonso kept Hamilton to the outside, Webber hit the back of the McLaren under braking, smashing the Red Bull’s front wing and spinning Hamilton through the gravel. The latter rejoined in sixth, with Webber falling to ninth.
Heikki Kovalainen got to the finish for Lotus in 13th, with Karun Chandhok also going the distance for Hispania in 14th. The other new team cars all retired – Lotus’s Jarno Trulli not even making the start due to hydraulic problems. Renault’s Vitaly Petrov was the other retirement, spinning into the gravel on lap nine.
The Australian GP certainly livened spirits damped by the boring race that was the Bahrain GP. The 2010 Formula One GP season now comes to Malaysia where monsoon season looks certain to keep things interesting for the team. Just a recap, last year’s Malaysian GP was called off half-way through the race as the heavens opened up and unleashed a wall of rain that resulted in some dramatic spin-outs.
Report written by Ben Viermann
