How Hamilton returned to winning ways

When Sebastian Vettel went spinning off at the beginning of Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, you'd have been forgiven for suspecting that it's probably only his most-devoted fans who threw their hands up in horror. For most people the reaction was probably a variation on 'yes!' amid the realisation that the world champion's departure opened things up for someone else to win.

The German was certainly due some bad luck. Of course both he and Red Bull have done a magnificent job this year, especially in qualifying, but the stats have been skewed by the fact that nothing has gone wrong for him. You could argue that Jenson Button's two retirements were team problems and therefore part of the game, but consider Fernando Alonso, who has also had a season almost free of blemishes - except for Montreal, where Button tapped him into retirement.

Vettel's non-finish cost him the chance to make a history by finishing all 19 races in the top four (although at least he now won't look back at that fourth place in Germany ruining a perfect run of podiums!). But what it also did was rob us of a potentially-thrilling battle between him and Lewis Hamilton. The McLaren man's victory was well deserved, but beating the Red Bull on the track would surely have made it that much sweeter.

"I think it would have been a close one," said McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh. "We had a strong race car, and it would have been a thrilling race with Sebastian. I'd like to feel that we could have beaten him in a straight fight.

"I don't know what happened, but he was clearly trying to push hard on that first lap, and if you do that you take some risks. Sebastian in fairness hasn't made too many mistakes this year, but we haven't put him under enough pressure to make those mistakes. It's good that he realised that we were competitive enough, and he had to push that hard."

"The whole team was frustrated, because we were in a great position to win the race today," said Red Bull team principal Christian Horner. "He did a superb job yesterday, one of the best laps of his career to nail that pole position, and he'd done everything right. He'd made the start, he made it comfortably into the lead in the first corner, and it was cruel luck to be forced to retire in the way he did. So of course he's disappointed."

McLaren would love to have beaten Vettel in a straight fight © LAT

Nevertheless, Vettel's retirement should in no way detract from the brilliant performance of Hamilton, who still had to get the job done and drive a faultless race as Alonso stayed close enough to keep him honest.

In fact, Hamilton was able to match what Vettel has been doing all year - by the end of a superb first lap he was already 2.5s clear of Alonso, ensuring that he would be safely out of DRS range once it became available. Alonso in turn did well to maintain that gap for the duration of the first stint.

Then on lap 15 he suddenly gained half a second, and a lap after that McLaren brought Hamilton in. Alonso followed him down the pitlane - there was no point in staying out given that Hamilton would have fresh, soft tyres - so everything depended on the second stops.

A better out lap gave Hamilton an extra second on his rival immediately after the first stops, and over the course of the stint his advantage grew as high as 5.6s, before slipping back to around 4s as traffic played a role.

"It was like a time trial race," said Alonso. "I was doing qualifying laps every lap, trying to close the gap, but one tenth up, one tenth down for the whole stint."

Nevertheless, Hamilton maintained a comfortable margin.

"We wanted to open a four-second gap and hold it," said Whitmarsh. "That's what Lewis planned to do if he got into that position, so he was just running that. Traffic was quite bad to be honest; that was a bit frightening. Also there were two or three groups of two or three cars that were racing, and they're always the worst ones to catch. That was a little bit frustrating obviously, but we ran the strategy well."

On lap 39 Hamilton's lead dropped to 3.1s, and it was time to get rid of the soft tyres, so he came in on the next lap. Ferrari's only chance was to extend Alonso's stint on the softs and hope that he could gain some ground while Hamilton was on the mediums.

We've seen many times this year that Ferrari has struggled on the prime in the final stint - although strangely it didn't happen in India, where Alonso held off Mark Webber - so that was another reason to keep the Spaniard out there.

Alonso's late final stop couldn't get him out ahead of Hamilton © LAT

"We knew that maybe we could overtake the McLaren at the second stop," Alonso acknowledged. "Because when we saw Lewis pitting, we had the tyres in more-or-less good condition to push for another two or three laps. So we did some good timed laps, and the team was informing me that we should be okay maybe to exit in front of him, or maybe on the limit, very close. But even with that, I knew that with 15 laps remaining, with the medium tyres, it was really difficult to stay in front of Lewis."

"Lewis pushed then," said Whitmarsh. "We felt pretty comfortable on the prime - it wasn't quite as quick a tyre, but we felt we could switch it on, and Lewis was able to go and do some decent quick times. In fact within a lap he was quicker than Fernando, but Fernando was obviously pushing as well.

"That's the time when obviously Fernando can push hard, but I think Lewis responded appropriately. I don't think we felt under threat, provided he didn't make a mistake. It's one of those situations where from halfway round the first lap it was our race to lose and we had to make sure we got it right."

The tiny chance that Alonso had of challenging Hamilton ended when, on his in lap he came across Daniel Ricciardo, who was minding his own business and also heading for the pits.

"When we were coming in it was unfortunate to have Ricciardo in front for the last two corners," rued Ferrari's Stefano Domenicali. "And there, honestly, we lost a lot of time. We had a little issue on the pitstop but that was not the real issue."

"Definitely, with the traffic on the pit entry, maybe we lost the opportunity to be close at the exit of the pits," said Alonso. "But I don't think that we lost the victory there. It was extremely difficult to beat the McLaren today."

It still wasn't over, as Hamilton had to stay out of trouble in traffic and bring the car home, but he had more speed than Alonso on those tyres and was able to eke out a safe cushion.

"I have to say today with the backmarkers it was not easy for everyone, and Lewis had the same issue with some backmarkers," said Domenicali.

Two lightning Hamilton laps on mediums kept Alonso at bay © sutton-images.com

"The difference was made when Lewis had two very quick laps with the medium tyres straight away, and he was able to pull out the gap, and then of course they managed the situation."

"We all know it's been a tough year for Lewis," added Whitmarsh. "So to come out and respond like that is what he needed and what he wanted, and the team wanted. Both drivers have now won three races apiece, and now we'll see if one of them can win four..."

For Alonso this was another superb performance as he continues to outperform the car. Before the race he pointed out that this was the ninth time he'd qualified fifth behind the Red Bulls and McLarens, and from there he could aim for his 73rd podium - at the only track where he had yet to achieve one. He'd forgotten that he never got a podium in Austria, but to be fair he only raced there in 2001 and '03!

He was gifted a place by Vettel, but the rest he did himself as he passed Webber and Button on the first lap to put himself in a position to challenge Hamilton. Even he can hardly believe that that with one race to go he lies just 10 points behind Button and 12 ahead of Webber. And the Australian, of course, has been driving a Red Bull all season.

The battle for third

It's been a long time since we've seen Button left trailing behind his team-mate, but there was a good reason for it, since from the early stages he was without KERS. That meant not only an instant loss of lap time, but it gave him other headaches as he tried to get the thing going again while trying to focus on the job of driving the car. Whitmarsh was full of praise for the job he did.

"From early in the first stint he had KERS failure," said the McLaren boss. "It took about 20 minutes to get it running again, but it wouldn't stay working so we had to continually reset it, which was a real challenge. Obviously you lose performance, and you have that balance change and the frustration of dealing with that.

"He had a variable car, and it's very, very difficult for a driver to get into any rhythm when you're in those situations.

"Just to cope with that, he had all the various switching to do, and the brake balance was being changed all the time. And in all that time he was subjected to a lot of pressure and was racing hard. It was massively impressive."

KERS or no KERS, Button held off Webber's challenge © sutton-images.com

Button explained: "The problem isn't just when you accelerate - it's when you brake. KERS provides a lot of engine braking, so every time I arrived at a corner I didn't know what I was going to get, either engine braking or not, so it was pretty tricky."

As in India, Button enjoyed an entertaining fight with Webber, one that was again conducted without the sort of dramas that inevitably surround any Hamilton/Felipe Massa confrontation.

Button's job was made easier when Webber was the victim of a rare Red Bull glitch at his first pitstop. It not only cost the Aussie priceless time to the Brit, but stranded him behind Massa as well.

"We had a nut come out of the socket on the right rear, which unfortunately cost him about two or three seconds," Horner explained. "Otherwise I think we would have been able to jump Jenson. But that then dropped him behind both Jenson and Felipe.

"At that point we had to do something different, otherwise we would have finished behind the two of them, which is why we opted to roll the dice and try a three-stop strategy."

When Webber stayed on the soft tyre at his second stop - guaranteeing that he would have to come in again - it came as a surprise to other teams.

"I'm kind of pleased that Red Bull ran that strategy," said Whitmarsh. "Providing that you were sure that he had to stop again, which we were!

"It was quite surprising as well. I thought Ferrari had a bigger fear or concern of using the prime, but I wouldn't have predicted that Red Bull would delay its use."

With stalemate at the front, Webber's tyre choice did at least add a little variety to the last part of the race as he began to run very quickly. It was always going to be hard to gain enough to make up for an extra stop, but at least he jumped Massa, if not Button.

Horner explained: "At that point we had nothing to lose. The likelihood of being beaten by Rosberg was pretty slim, so we went for a three-stop to try and pull out a gap. It worked very well to pass Felipe, but unfortunately Jenson was a bit too quick on the prime. We got to about 12s; we needed 20s."

And what about that debris that Webber was carrying around?

Massa spun trying to keep up with third place battle © sutton-images.com

"That was a bit of rubber that had come off Sebastian's car that he managed to hoover up! I think it would have had a small effect. Unfortunately he couldn't find a way past Jenson in the first stint, and his pace was strong today."

This was another race that did few favours for Massa. Staying ahead of Webber would have given him a boost, but instead he had a very public spin. But that wasn't the only reason he couldn't stay ahead of the Red Bull, as the race turned into a real struggle for him, in part because Ferrari reverted to the old wing for qualifying and the race.

"There was a fight between Jenson, Mark and myself, for a long part of the race," said the Brazilian. "But I was struggling a little bit, especially due to changing the front wing on the car. In qualifying I raced with the old one and I lost a lot of grip, a lot of downforce, because of that. And also when we put the hard tyres on the situation was very difficult: it was difficult to keep the car on the track; it was sliding everywhere."

His home race in Brazil represents the last chance for Massa to redeem himself this year, and he risks ending the season as the first regular Ferrari driver since Ivan Capelli in 1992 to fail to finish on the podium. It's hard to believe that just three years ago he went to Interlagos challenging Hamilton for the world championship.