Alonso Wins in the Singapore Formula 1 Grand Prix

Moving up to second in the drivers’ championship Alonso sets his sights on first

28 September 2010

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso has had a great streak in Formula 1 lately

winning both this weekends’ Singapore Grand Prix and the last race at Monza. Against Red Bull’s more powerful car Alonso has managed to keep them at bay as Vettel and Webber are both starting to make big impacts in the race with their faster pace. The race was not without incident though as two safety-car periods were needed: first when Liuzzi stopped on track because of suspension damage and secondly when Kobayashi ploughed his Sauber into the railings at turn 18 accumulating Bruno Senna with him. There has yet to be a Grand Prix in Singapore without the use of a safety car and it really did play about with the race. Alonso was keeping Vettel at bay and he did well to defend his position despite the safety car periods. Vettel’s teammate Mark Webber made the somewhat risky decision at the time to pit during the first safety car period, the only one of the front 5 drivers, to switch to the compound harder tyres for the remainder of the race. This left him re-joining the race in 11th position and having to fight his way back up the field, which he did with great skill and fluidity. By the end of the second safety car period the field had closed up again with Webber ahead of the Mclaren’s after both Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button pitted on laps 29 and 30 respectively. When the race restarted Lewis Hamilton tried to take Mark Webber on the outside going into turn seven, however Hamilton had not completed the pass and ended up colliding with Mark Webber leaving Hamilton to retire on lap 35 due to damage. Ferrari made sure that Alonso pitted on the same lap as Vettel to ensure that he stayed ahead and sure enough they both did and Alonso came out first and went on to win the race. The final standings were Alonso in first followed by Vettel with his teammate Webber not far behind in third and finally McLaren’s Jenson Button in 4th. So another disastrous race for the McLaren team having only one of their drivers’ finish; Hamilton must be fuming but he really needs to collect himself and focus on the next few races and pull out some decent results or he’ll find that his chance at the Drivers’ Championship title will disappear. The next Grand Prix is in Japan and is less than 2 weeks away but that’s still a long way off yet, so why not get pumped for what’ll sure be an exciting, nail-biting, heart-pumping race to the end of the Formula 1 season with some good old Karting.