Malaysian GP - Vettel finally gets there

I didn't see qualifying for Malaysia - I think I was somewhere on the M5 at the time and for reasons I don't quite understand, I couldn't listen to it on the radiogram in the car either. Thanks to the wonders of the BBC F1 website, I got a potted highlights last night - wow, sorry I missed it! Some typically moist Malaysian weather made McLaren and Ferrari look rather foolish, with only Button making it through to Q2. Unfortunately, he was busy looking for a spade to dig himself out of a gravel trap, so never took part. Both Lotus cars were ahead of the Ferarris, both Force India and Williams cars made it into the top 10 and Rosberg managed an excellent 2nd place on the grid. Webber bagged pole with a stunning drive on intermediate tyres whilst everyone else was paddling around on full wets.

It didn't do him a lot of good though. He was caught napping by Vettel at the first corner of the race this morning and had to make do with 2nd place behind his team mate at the end. Rosberg held on for 3rd place and with the forecast rain not materialising, the race was notably quieter than Australia's, but still had some good overtaking moves as the big hitters made their way up through the field and jostled with each other for position. Hamilton was pushing his luck by weaving across the track to keep Sutil behind him, but got away with a warning. Kubica put in another strong performance for 4th place, showing the sort of talent for dragging a lacklustre car up the pecking order that Schumacher used to demonstrate. After being out-qualified by him team mate yet again, Schuey exited the race with a wheel/suspension failure.

Alonso spent the whole race with an unpleasant-sounding downshift problem and was stuck behind Hamilton with 2 laps to go. An over-optimistic move saw him briefly in front, but then his engine blew. Bummer.

The Virgin of Di Grassi made it to the end for their first F1 finish and both Hispania cars and a Lotus crawled home too, meaning all the newcomers had a finish this race for the first time. Unless you count Sauber. De la Rosa never even made it to the start and Kobayashi went out early on too.

So Vettel finally got a deserved win, and if Red Bull can keep their cars running, they look very handy indeed.

Three races in, 3 different winners (Alonso, Button, Vettel) and three different teams too. And who's leading the championship? Massa...

(Sham 69 are using some pointless brackets for "(If) The Kids Are United".)

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