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The title fight that turned on tyre failures

At first the tyres held back Vettel back, but when the British GP chaos proved that was unsustainable, the Red Bull man was unleashed. MARK HUGHES tells the full story of F1 2013

Should anyone really be surprised those 2013-spec Pirellis began to go pop? Not only were they structurally inadequate for the high, long-duration loads of Silverstone during the British Grand Prix, but also placed upon those tyres were the heavy hopes of the sport in preventing Red Bull's real underlying superiority from becoming fully apparent.

The tyres were not up to such demands and so the second half of the final season of the 2.4-litre V8 formula played out on tougher rubber and total Red Bull annihilation of the field, with Sebastian Vettel recording a nine-race consecutive victory streak that finally equalled the all-time record of Alberto Ascari set back in 1952-53.

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