Red Bull : second victory for Vettel

Sebastian Vettel had not tasted anything this sweet since the Malaysian Grand Prix last 4^th April. The German driver won the European Grand Prix in Valencia, the ninth race of the season, on Sunday.

This second victory puts him in third place in the general rankings. This successful result was entirely deserved, as the Red Bull driver had dominated throughout the weekend. After having driven to pole position (his third this season, and the eighth in nine Grand Prix on behalf of the Milton Keynes garage) Vettel led the race from start to finish. Although Lewis Hamilton, who finished second, was hot on his heels to begin with, the RB 6 N° 5 regularly clocked up fastest laps to widen a significant gap and allow the German driver to finish the race unworried.

The other memorable event of this Grand Prix was the very spectacular accident suffered by Mark Webber.  Having been 2^nd on the grid, the Australian fluffed his start and dropped seven places on the first lap. After around ten laps, Webber found himself behind Heikki Kovalainen. The Red Bull driver then flew off the rear of the Lotus while attempting to overtake the Finn, crashing into the ground after an aerial somersault. Webber was, nevertheless, more shaken than injured, and was able to get out of his car without delay, and made it back to the pits quickly.

Renault: Kubica in the top 5

After this accident, several drivers did not comply with the arrival of the Safety Car. Robert Kubica and Vitaly Petrov were amongst those involved and were hit with a 5” penalty by the race committee. However, this decision had no consequence regarding the Pole's classification. He finished 5^th and retained that position and so bags another ten points in the Championship ranking. “Getting fifth with Robert is an excellent result that allows us to narrow the gap between us and Mercedes (who only scored 1 point) in the Constructors' Championship,” said Eric Boullier, the Renault team boss, who had already welcomed a first piece of good news during the qualifying session.

On Saturday, Renault succeeded in placing both its drivers in Q3, for the second time this season. Unfortunately, this good performance was not confirmed by Vitaly Petrov in the race. He got off to a complicated start and rapidly found himself bogged down in the soft underbelly of the running, in 15^th. “I'm disappointed by my result, because, when you start 10^th, your ambition is to finish at least in the same position,” explained Petrov. He improved his position, but finished just out of the top ten and the points in 11^th position, before the penalty from the race committee downgraded him to 14^th.