Korean Grand Prix

The F1 Championship battle turned on its head after Fernando Alonso won the inaugural Korean Grand Prix and both the Red Bulls failing to cross the finish line. Lewis Hamilton kept his title hopes alive with a second place finish while defending champion Jenson Button all but ended his title hopes with a disappointing 12^th.

The first ever Korean Grand Prix was delayed due to a continuous downpour making the track unfit for racing. The race started with the safety car on the track and after three laps, the race was red flagged for safety reasons. 37 minutes after the official start time, the race resumed behind the safety car and finally on Lap 17, the safety car was withdrawn and real racing began with Sebastian Vettel in the lead followed by Webber, Alonso and Hamilton.

Three laps later, in what could be the turning point of the Championship, Webber skid off the track and rebounded off the barriers into the path of Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes taking him out of the race and bringing the safety car back on track.

Once the safety car pitted on Lap 23, Vettel raced away into the lead as Alonso, Hamilton, Massa and Button struggled to keep up. Button was the first among the leaders to pit as he changed into intermediary tyres on the drying track. Hamilton, Massa, Schumacher and Vettel followed him into the pits over a couple of laps. Ferrari had some problems with Alonso’s wheel and the Spaniard rejoined the race behind Hamilton in third.

The safety car was back on track on Lap 32 after Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Buemi collided into Virgin’s Tino Glock. When the race resumed, Vettel once again surged into the lead. Hamilton made an error on the corner and Alonso capitalized on this to take second place. With 45 laps gone, Vettel seemed to be cruising and had 25 points in his kitty.

And then disaster struck! Vettel’s engine blew up and before they knew it, the Red Bull was in flames thus gifting Alonso the race lead. There was not much action on the last 10 laps as Alonso crossed the chequered flag with Hamilton following him 14.9 seconds later. Massa had a brilliant race to finish third while Michael Schumacher equaled his best result on comeback with 4^th place followed by Kubica, Liuzzi and Barrichelo. Button had a race to forget as he finished a lowly 12^th.

This was Alonso’s 5^th win of the season and 3^rd in 4 races as he now leads the Championship with 231 points, 11 ahead of Webber. Hamilton and Vettel are tied on third position with 206 points while Button’s Championship is as good as over with 189 points. With 50 points still up for grabs, even the Constructors Championship is wide open with Red Bull on 426 points and McLaren on 399 thus giving a ‘do not miss’ status to the last two races of the season in Sao Paolo and Abu Dhabi.