The Third Step
Two rounds into the 2008 world championship, patterns are beginning to emerge - and some have cause to be concerned. Richard Barnes looks at the Sepang weekend and how it affects the standings
After the chaotic events and mere handful of finishers at Melbourne, most of the teams and drivers who failed in Australia would have arrived in Malaysia with one minimum requirement for the weekend - to fix their problems, make it to the finish and get on to the championship leaderboard.
Almost predictably in this hyper-professional era of Formula One, that is exactly what Sunday's Malaysian Grand Prix delivered. Even in possibly the harshest conditions on the calender, the stifling equatorial heat and dust claimed only two mechanical retirements - hydraulic problems ending the race of Force India's Adrian Sutil early, while the luckless Sebastian Vettel succumbed to another Ferrari engine failure in his Toro Rosso, just as he had in Australia.
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