Vettel wins the European Grand Prix!

Sebastian Vettel won an eventful European Grand Prix on Sunday afternoon, ahead of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button.

The German led from start to finish and took his second win of the season.

Knowing the first corners of the race might be his best opportunity to make up some places, Lewis Hamilton took an excellent start to immediately clear Webber and challenge Vettel for the lead.

The German held firm though and completed the opening lap with a one second gap to the McLaren Mercedes driver. He then set a string of fastest lap and was leading by three seconds when the safety car at to be deployed for the very first time in Valencia.

Mark Webber had a huge shunt on lap 10 after colliding with Heikki Kovalainen. The Australian, having found himself down the order after a tough opening lap and an early pitstop (L8), was looking for a way past when he clipped the rear of the Finn’s Lotus and was thrown into the air. The Red Bull landed upside down and then flipped back the right way and ploughed into the Turn 17 escape road tyre barrier. The Australian luckily emerged unscathed from the crash.

Kovalainen made it back to the pits to retire.

The rest of the field took advantage of the safety car period to dive in the pitlane. Vettel and Hamilton rejoined in P1 and P2 while both Ferraris of Alonso and Massa slipped down the order. Kobayashi didn’t stop while the safety car was out and moved up to P3 ahead of Button and Barrichello.

The Safety Car released the field at the end of lap 14. Vettel came under intense pressure from Hamilton but fended off the assault of his rival to remain in the lead. The Red Bull driver quickly got back up to full speed to slightly pull away at the front.

Hamilton’s chances were dealt a blow on lap 25 when he received a drive-through for overtaking the safety car. His team instructed him to attack Vettel before serving his penalty and he immediately upped to pace to try to close the gap to the leader. He pitted on lap 28 and managed to rejoin the race in second place, ahead of Kobayashi.

Now enjoying a relatively comfortable margin, Vettel slightly slowed down to manage his tyres and preserve his RB6. Hamilton kept on pushing hard but found himself stuck behind Glock and Senna. He eventually made his way through but lost two seconds in the process. The Virgin and HRT drivers were in their own battle and made contact. Both of them had to pit as Glock picked up a puncture and Senna damaged his front nose.

Refusing to give up, Hamilton cut Vettel’s lead down to 7 seconds with nine laps to go. The German was forced to up his pace again and set a new fastest lap of the race on lap 52.

Running in a solid third place, Kobayashi made his one and only pitstop on lap 54 and rejoined in 9th place, right behind Alonso. A mistake from the Spaniard on the penultimate lap handed the Japanese eighth place. Taking advantage of his fresh tyres, Kobayashi then jumped Buemi to cross the finish line in 7th position.

Vettel won the race ahead of Hamilton and Button. But the reigning World Champion might lose his podium as he was due to be investigated after the race for exceeding the Safety Car in-lap time.

Also under investigation were fourth-placed Barrichello, fifth-placed Kubica, sixth-placed Sutil, eighth-placed Buemi, tenth-placed De la Rosa, eleventh-placed Petrov and thirteenth-placed Liuzzi.

Final standings after all these drivers have been given a 5s penalty :