Vettel finally shows his hand

The Singapore track revealed the Red Bull RB9/Sebastian Vettel combination's full potential for perhaps the first time this season.

The emphasis on low-speed downforce played perfectly to the car's strengths, and the big direction changes into slow corners were perfect for Vettel, with his skill in manipulating the car's weight transfer to allow him to get off the brakes and onto the gas earlier than anyone. As a total package they were utterly devastating, by far the most dominant they have been all year.

When he needed to be, Vettel was over two seconds per lap faster than the world's best drivers in the best cars. The tougher 2012 generation of tyre has probably also aided Red Bull, allowed its downforce advantage to be fully used. An inopportunely-timed safety car stole 10 seconds of his advantage, yet still he won by over half a minute.

Fernando Alonso seemed to transcend a Ferrari that had no business finishing second, while Kimi Raikkonen classily and patiently drove his Lotus from 13th on the grid to the podium. These three drivers fill the top spots in the championship points table, and Vettel's margin there is of a similar magnitude to the pace advantage he enjoyed on Sunday evening.

Vettel's biggest threat to his start-to-finish domination should have come from Nico Rosberg, who angled his Mercedes aggressively towards the polesitting Red Bull as they sat on the grid and got it off the line faster - enough to get him alongside and even slightly ahead as they raced into the turn.

Rosberg made things tough for Vettel at the first corner © LAT

But with front tyres not yet fully up to temperature he couldn't carry that speed in from that shallow angle, and ran wide onto the flattened exit kerb as Vettel charged by to his left. No one saw Seb again, just the occasional floodlight glints from his rapidly disappearing rear wing.

Alonso, meanwhile, had maintained all the momentum from the Ferrari's brilliant start and simply pointed himself down the outside - past Lewis Hamilton's bogged-down Mercedes even as he was flicking into third gear, then around the outside of Romain Grosjean's Lotus and slicing into third place across the bows of Mark Webber.

Grosjean took advantage to slip inside Webber into Turn 3, but the Red Bull hung on side by side as they raced through Turn 5 onto Raffles Boulevard, flicked to his right as they screamed flat-out through the kink and stayed there as they rounded the tight left of Turn 7, demoting the Lotus to fifth.

In the second Ferrari, Felipe Massa had been similarly fast off the line but was blocked by slower-starting cars on the inside line. Massa was zapped for sixth by Hamilton's Mercedes down the Nicoll Highway into Turn 8, but Lewis had only been able to do this after getting a faster exit from Turn 7 by running off the track. He was ordered to give the place back.

Up they went to the Recreation Club at Turn 9 and off down the long straight of St Andrew's Road, past the court house, heading straight towards the parliament building before the reprofiled Turn 10 that flicks them left into the chicane and over Anderson Bridge, which traverses the Singapore River. As they did so, Vettel was pulling out whole car lengths over Rosberg at every braking and corner-entry zone.

On they went down Esplanade Drive, the overlooking towers blinking beautiful neon in the waters of the marina as the noise of 22 Formula 1 engines at 18,000rpm rebounded off the urban furniture. A tight right into Raffles Avenue forms Turn 14, and again Vettel opened a big chunk over his pursuers, with that advantage magnified in each of the final sector's many right-angled turns.

Vettel soon had the track to himself © XPB

He was almost two seconds clear as he crossed the start-finish line beneath the East Coast Parkway flyover. Lap two he completed in 1m52.866s; second-placed Rosberg was the next fastest - at 1m55.031s, 2.2 seconds slower!

Soon Vettel was all on his piercingly noisy own, then a gap in the noise for six seconds or more before Rosberg, Alonso, Webber, Grosjean and Massa in a closely-matched ducking-and-diving pack scrapping between the night-time walls over Vettel's crumbs. Seb sprinting off into the distance may not have made for a great spectacle, but to see it was to understand you were watching something quite special.

It's not all car. Webber was proving that, and as early as lap 11 was beginning to feel the rear tyres beginning to fade with heat degradation, losing him touch from the back of Alonso. He was brought in on lap 13, which seemed to consign him to a three-stopping race rather than a two.

The former was theoretically faster on these tyres (unlike last year), but that took no account of the traffic delays. If you could get far enough ahead, like Vettel, a two-stop would be preferable.

The super-soft Pirelli (which everyone other than Adrian Sutil's Force India started on) had shown itself to be superior to the medium, not quite as durable, but durable enough and faster for longer. It was most durable of all on Vettel's Red Bull - but not Webber's. If you could carry the momentum into the slow corners like Seb, you didn't fall as far beneath the traction threshold, didn't give yourself as much acceleration to do on the corner exits. Through the more-flowing middle sector Mark could match Seb; through the tight right-angles he was nowhere near.

Di Resta's strategy placed him third ahead of Alonso for several laps © XPB

Webber's stop triggered Ferrari into bringing Alonso in. He exited still ahead of Webber, both now fitted with a fresh set of primes, both now behind Paul di Resta's Force India, intending to run as long as possible for an unambiguous two-stop strategy.

Rosberg and the distantly following Grosjean were in from second and third on lap 15, on schedule for two-stop races, and Hamilton trailed them in on the same lap, giving Mercedes a double-shuffle stop. Grosjean was fitted with a set of options, the Mercs with primes. Rosberg got out just ahead of the di Resta/Alonso/Webber train, with Grosjean and Hamilton a few seconds behind it.

Vettel stayed out front until lap 17, pitted and rejoined on his primes without even losing the lead. Di Resta finally pitted on lap 20, releasing Alonso to resume his chase of Rosberg, but now over eight seconds behind.

Vettel had crossed the line to begin his 25th lap when Daniel Ricciardo - having a difficult race after his Toro Rosso bogged down terribly off the line, dropping him to the lower orders well below his ninth-place qualifying slot - dropped it going into Turn 18.

It was an innocuous-looking lock-up into the 90-degree left-hander that takes the track beneath a grandstand, just past where Nelson Piquet Jr performed his infamous 2008 crash. But this one was nowhere near as conveniently timed - certainly not for Red Bull, as the safety car was deployed.

"It was the worst possible timing for us," related team boss Christian Horner. "We weren't in a window with Seb where we could go to the end of the race and had only recently changed tyres."

With 36 laps to go it seemed unlikely that even a new set of the slower mediums would complete the distance. Mercedes shared Red Bull's view on that, but Ferrari and Lotus didn't. For Ferrari it was a gamble.

Alonso knew he might have to improvise © XPB

"We knew that we didn't have the pace today so we had to invent something," said Alonso, "and a different strategy was worth the risk. We are nowhere, so far behind in the points, that it was worth trying something." He was fitted with a set of primes.

Massa was proving way harder on his rear tyres than team-mate Alonso and the safety car was a relief for him as his mediums had already given up just 10 laps into the stint. There was no way he was going to get to the end on another set so, knowing he had to stop again anyway, he was fitted with a set of super-softs in the hope that these could be used to boost him quickly past those ahead. Just as with the Vettel/Webber comparison, Alonso/Massa showed that both pace and tyre use here were very much about the driver.

The Lotuses also pitted for primes, the intention very much to get to the end on them, while the McLarens of Jenson Button and Sergio Perez received the same.

"The safety car completely changed our strategy," regretted Button. "We'd been intending to spend most of the distance on the super-soft and maybe three-stop as the car was much happier on that tyre. But this forced us onto the medium and the car was quite difficult on that."

Vettel's margin of 10s over Rosberg had been wiped out and they circulated now in a line ahead of Webber, Hamilton, Alonso, Grosjean, di Resta (who'd only recently stopped for another set of options and was therefore obliged to stop again), Massa, Button and Raikkonen. Kimi had been having an alternately forceful and patient race, competitive adrenalin overcoming his back pain.

Ricciardo had a terrible evening © XPB

It took quite a while to remove the damaged Toro Rosso and longer again to allow the lapped cars to unlap themselves and get to the back of the queue. This was all moving things in favour of those trying to get to the end without stopping again.

Racing got under way once more at the end of the 30th lap - around half-distance. Vettel was absolutely amazing as he simply disappeared up the road even more resoundingly than on the first lap. His first flyer was 2.2s faster than Rosberg's, his next 2.3s. But they had two very different perspectives. For Red Bull and Vettel, the threat was Alonso, not reckoning on stopping again and with the three drivers between Seb and Fernando - Rosberg, Webber and Hamilton - all needing to.

Vettel therefore had to try, during the remaining life of his tyres, to pull out 30 seconds on Alonso in order to be able to pit and still emerge ahead of the Ferrari. "We gave Seb a target of 15 laps, told him to do what he could," said Horner, "and his pace during that period was just phenomenal; building up 30s to Fernando gave him a clear stop. Absolutely remarkable - just a class of his own."

It was remarkable, but that pace advantage of two seconds was almost certainly exaggerated. Vettel was flat-out; all those behind were stuck at the pace of Rosberg, who knew the Mercedes didn't have the pace to even attempt to pull a stop's worth of margin over Alonso. The Merc's multi-element front wing was partially blocked by the extensive rubber debris thrown up from the track, costing him significant front downforce.

Rosberg was being encouraged to push harder over the radio and replied that he couldn't afford to do so, that he needed to be there at the end. He was convinced that had he pushed at this point, he'd only have forced himself into an earlier stop, thereby compromising his strategy. It was actually an impressively composed drive.

Grosjean couldn't believe his bad luck © LAT

Webber and Hamilton were looking on from not far behind, just ahead of Alonso and Grosjean. The Lotus man's chances looked good, but luck wasn't with him. He was audibly gutted when his engine suddenly lost power three laps after the restart. The hydraulics feeding the pneumatic valves had leaked and he was retired not long after.

Rosberg's measured pace played further to the flying Vettel's advantage, because among those trapped in the eight-car queue behind the Merc was Alonso.

Post-race, Rosberg felt that he should perhaps have been brought in at the safety car, for he would have rejoined still ahead of Alonso and on new tyres. Mercedes didn't believe that it had the rear-tyre durability to have done the 36-lap final stint that would have entailed. Rosberg finally came in on the 41st lap, forced to respond to Webber's stop the lap before.

The Red Bull stop was perfect, Rosberg's less so. He missed his marks marginally, requiring the crew to shuffle up to him, and there was further delay as his front wing had the rubber debris removed. The stop took 3.6s, 0.7s longer than Webber's and, combined with a strong out-lap from Mark, it cost Rosberg the position. Hamilton was in two laps later - also missing his marks - and emerged right behind his team-mate.

Almost half a minute before that, Vettel had pitted from the lead. He was stationary for just 2.8s as a set of brand-new super-softs was fitted - the set he'd saved by having gambled on doing just one Q3 run the day before. His superiority just kept feeding upon itself.

Raikkonen bears down on Button © XPB

The winner was now essentially decided. But the battle for second seemed set to get rather fruity. Alonso, Button, Raikkonen and Perez lay second, third, fourth and fifth on tyres that were now getting old. The old-tyred Saubers of Nico Hulkenberg and Esteban Gutierrez lay between them and the fast trio of fresh-tyred drivers - Webber, Rosberg and Hamilton - who were closing fast, even while dicing between themselves.

With the Mercs bearing down on him, Webber needed to dispose of Gutierrez fast, and did him around the outside of Turn 7 with 11 laps to go. But he was followed through in quick succession by the Mercs.

Meanwhile, third-placed Button was running out of rear-tyre grip and Raikkonen was beginning to press him hard. "I could see he was in trouble and I knew the new-tyred cars were coming fast, so I pushed," related Kimi.

He finally nailed the McLaren on lap 54 with a dramatic-looking move around the outside of Turn 14, the medium-speed right onto Raffles Avenue. Raikkonen played it down: "It's easy when you have more grip and have the outside line and he is on the inside."

Once the Lotus was past, it pulled away from the now drastically struggling Button by around 3s per lap. But he was 15s distant from Alonso, who was not significantly slower. The podium places now looked set and it was just a question of how much thrilling wheel-to-wheel dicing there might be left between the mix of old and new-tyred cars behind.

Webber was upon Hulkenberg and past at Turn 7, the gripless Sauber passed in quick succession by the two chasing Mercs. Next in Webber's sights, while still keeping an eye on his mirrors, was Perez. Complicating things further for Mark was a request from the pit wall to short-shift, because the engine was showing ominous signs of a loss of water pressure.

Webber's Red Bull gives up the ghost © XPB

Just as the Mercs passed the Sauber, di Resta, hard on their tails, slid straight on into the barrier at Turn 7. "I'm still not sure what happened," related Paul, "but I took the corner the same way as I had done the previous lap and the car went straight on and wouldn't stop. The team is investigating what happened."

Webber, his sick engine healthier than Perez's tyres, took the McLaren for fifth place on lap 55, with the ever-slower Button just a little way ahead. He did him at the end of the first DRS zone into Turn 1 on the next lap.

Towards the end of the following lap both Mercs were able to nip by the now-crippled McLarens and were followed through by a charging Massa, who'd made a third stop and was coming back through.

Webber by now was in a bad way, his engine losing water and getting ever hotter. Rosberg and Hamilton breezed by, then Massa too. Finally the Red Bull's engine gave out and was belching flame as he pulled off.

Vettel took the chequer and, in the 32.6s gap before second-placed Alonso arrived, the firework display began, lighting up the night sky.

As Raikkonen, Rosberg, Hamilton, Massa, Button, Perez, Hulkenberg and Sutil followed at a distance, it was clear that Vettel had lit up the track too. He now has 33 grand prix victories to his name but this was one of the most resounding. Worthy of cheers, not the boos he received.