On Saturday, a serious accident involving Sergio Perez's led to qualifying to be delayed while on Sunday Vitaly Petrov was involved in a crash that saw him being taken away by ambulance after picking up a leg injury.The race was red flagged, but restarted after an 11-minute stop and Vettel - who had fresh rubber fitted to his car during the break - eased his Red Bull home with Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button closely behind.
Earlier, Vettel made a clean start alongside Button and Alonso. From then on it turned into a battle of the strategies.
McLaren looked like they had one over their rivals when they pitted Button earlier than usual for supersofts and got him out in clean air. However, his team-mate Lewis Hamilton's crash with Felipe Massa probably cost Button a potential win after the Safety Car was deployed.
That allowed the field to bunch up and with Button forced to stop for a third time, he lost valuable time to the top two, but Red Bull and Ferrari's decision not to pit their drivers again gave the McLaren driver an opportunity to attack on fresher rubber.
The trio found themselves tail-to-tail for the best part of 15 laps, but more drama was to follow with eight laps to go after Adrian Sutil, Petrov and Hamilton got tangled up during their scrap for sixth place together with backmarker Jaime Alguersuari. Petrov and Alguersuari both crashed out and the Safety Car was deployed. The race was then red-flagged as the medical team was called to tend to Petrov.
Once the track was cleared, the race was restarted under the Safety Car and turned into a five-lap shoot-out. Vettel, Alonso and Button held station, but there was one final incident when Hamilton tried to squeeze past Pastor Maldonado in sixth place. The duo made contact and the Williams driver came off second best.
The McLaren driver finished sixth while Mark Webber fourth and Kamui Kobayashi was fifth.
Results
01. Vettel Red Bull-Renault 2h09:38.373
02. Alonso Ferrari + 1.138
03. Button McLaren-Mercedes + 2.378
04. Webber Red Bull-Renault + 23.100
05. Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari + 26.900
06. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes + 27.200
07. Sutil Force India-Mercedes + 1 lap
08. Heidfeld Renault + 1 lap
09. Barrichello Williams-Cosworth + 1 lap
10. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap
11. Rosberg Mercedes + 1 lap
12. Di Resta Force India-Mercedes + 2 laps
13. Trulli Lotus-Renault + 2 laps
14. Kovalainen Lotus-Renault + 2 laps
15. D'Ambrosio Virgin-Cosworth + 2 laps
16. Liuzzi HRT-Cosworth + 3 laps
17. Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth + 3 laps
18. Maldonado Williams-Cosworth + 5 aps
Retirements
Petrov Renault 68
Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari 68
Massa Ferrari 33
Schumacher Mercedes 33
Glock Virgin-Cosworth 31
Perez Sauber-Ferrari 1
Source: Planet-F1
