Well it had to end sometime and boy did it!
This was the first time this season that we had a two time winner. After the previous seven races with seven different winners this was the weekend that it changed.
After a brilliant qualifying lap from Sebastian Vettel to grab pole position away from Lewis Hamilton it seemed that he would win this race for a third time in a row.
What started out as a pretty normal race with Vettel racing towards an easy win and leading by 20 seconds and only racing against himself it all changed in dramatic circumstances.
On lap 27 Jean-Eric Verne collided into Heikki Kovalainen which brought out the safety car and bunched all the cars back up and it would stay that way until lap 34 when the safety car went back in. At this point Fernando Alonso was somehow in third after starting 11th. When the safety car went in Vettel again kept the lead but that was short lived as moments later he was pulled up on the side of the road with a mechanical failure.
This gave Frenchman Romain Grosjean the lead but he also failed to finish as he too had a failure giving the lead to an unlikely Alonso followed by Hamilton and a fighting Pastor Maldonado who was hunting Lewis down and looked like he was going to overtake him when a mistake wiped Hamilton out and resulted in Pastor picking up a time penalty after the race.
Two drivers cutting through the field on fresh tyres was Michael Schumacher and Red Bull’s Mark Webber who started a lowly 19th place. Schumacher seemed to be turning back the clock a produced a brilliant drive to finish on the podium and pick up 15 well deserved points.
Kimi Raikkonen picked up a great 2nd place from starting in 5th but the drive of the day was Fernando Alonso who was disappointed after failing to get into Q3 on Saturday but ended the weekend with tears in his eyes after winning in front of his home crowd.
Drivers’ Championship
- Fernando Alonso 111pts
- Mark Webber 91pts
- Lewis Hamilton 88pts
Constructors’ Championship
- Red Bull Racing 176pts
- McLaren Mercedes 137pts
- Lotus – Renault 126pts
The next race weekend will be 6th – 8th July when we head to Silverstone for the British Grand Prix