Ferrari's Alonso wins Chinese Grand Prix
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E-mail Shanghai Daily, April 15, 2013
Ferrari's Fernando Alonso snatched his second Formula One victory in Shanghai yesterday, coming home comfortably to win the Chinese Grand Prix with a sharp start and a right pit-stop strategy.
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Ferrari driver Fernando Alonso is sprayed with champagne by second placed Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain after winning the Chinese Formula One Grand Prix in Shanghai, China. |
The Spaniard, who started third behind pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes and Lotus' Kimi Raikkonen, took the lead on the fifth lap by overtaking the Briton and fairly dominated the 56-lap race, finishing in one hours, 36 minutes and 27 seconds.
Finland's Raikkonen came in second, about 10 seconds later. Hamilton held off defending champion Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull by two-tenths of a second to complete a trio of world champions on the podium.
Last year's winner at the Shanghai International Circuit, Mercedes's Nico Roseberg, retired on the 23rd lap. Vettel's teammate Mark Webber had to quit the race as well after his right rear wheel rolled off his car on the 16th lap.
German Vettel, who started from ninth position yesterday, still leads the drivers' standings on 52 points after three stops. Raikkonen stayed second with a three-point gap while Alonso climbed to third with 43 points.
"Definitely it was a fantastic race for us, from the start to the end, without big problems with the car. The tire degradation was better than expected probably, so we managed more or less the pace," said Alonso, enjoying his 31st victory in the podium. "Amazing fans all weekend and it's very nice to race here. It feels great after the retirement in Malaysia, we had some pressure to finish the race."
So authoritative was Alonso's performance that his team was cautioning the driver in the closing stages not to push too hard, only for the Spaniard to reply that he wasn't.
Although he was overtaken by the Ferrari duo of Alonso and Felipe Massa and dropped to fourth at the start, Raikkonen claimed his second podium in the past three races and also a 20th consecutive finish in Formula One.
"I think we just had wrong settings. The practice start was very good but then it was really bad the real start and I lost some positions. After that the car was okay," Raikkonen said at the press conference.
The nose of his Lotus car was damaged in a slight rear-end collision when the Finn was trying to overtake McLaren's Sergio Perez but the Iceman surprisingly managed to finish the race with the damaged car.
Hamilton was simply glad to be on the podium as his Mercedes's tires were badly degraded on the last few laps after an early third pit-stop on the 37th lap.
"My tires were shot at the end and there was nothing I could do really to hold off Sebastian; a little bit unlucky with some traffic," said Hamilton, who has won in Shanghai twice.
Jenson Button, of McLaren, was fifth, with Massa sixth.
Daniel Ricciardo, of Toro Rosso, Force India's Paul di Resta, Romain Grosjean of Lotus and Nico Hulkenberg, of Sauber, rounded out the top 10.
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