Vettel finishes season with victory in Brazil, Webber takes second

Sebastian Vettel finished the 2013 season in style with a win at Brazil -his 13th of the season and ninth in a row. That takes him in equality to Michael Schumacher’s record of most victories in a season(set in 2004) and Alberto Ascari’s record of most consecutive victories, set back in 1953.

But the man under the spotlight this afternoon was Mark Webber who finished his final Grand Prix in second place having started the race in fourth. The Australian driver made another of his poor getaways and lost out to Lewis Hamilton on the opening lap. But with a superior RB9, he was able to catch not only the 2008 world champion but also Hamilton’s teammate Nico Rosberg and Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso.

Fernando Alonso finished in third place – his first podium since September’s Singapore Grand Prix.It was a memorable ending for McLaren after a tough season. The MP4-28 worked extremely well in dry conditions with Jenson Button and Sergio Perez flying throughout the race and finishing in fourth and sixth places.

In between the two McLaren drivers came Nico Rosberg. The German who started the race from the front row passed Sebastian Vettel on the run down to Senna S, but couldn’t keep the four time world champion behind for long. Mercedes were carrying a lot more downforce, expecting rain for a third consecutive day at Interlagos. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case and Nico Rosberg lost out the lead on the second lap and from there went only backwards. In the end he finished in fifth place.

Felipe Massa ran in fourth for some part of the race before a drive through penalty for having all four wheels on the pit lane entry white line hurt his chances of a strong finish in front of his home crowd. However, he didn’t miss the chance of doing some donuts on his final race for Ferrari.

Behind Massa came Nico Hulkenberg who had an uneventful afternoon on his way to eighth place finish in Brazil. That wasn’t the case for Lewis Hamilton. The British driver made contact with Valtteri Bottas, getting a puncture in the process and forcing the latter out of the race. Hamilton would have hoped that it was his final visit to the pits but Stewards had other ideas and they gave the Mercedes driver a drive through penalty for his collision with the Finn.

Daniel Ricciardo finished in 10th place on his final outing for Toro Rosso, ahead of the scrap between Esteban Gutierrez and Paul di Resta. Adrian Sutil put on some good moves in the race and was right behind this duo but eventually ran out of laps on his way to 13th place.

Heikki Kovalainen finished in 14th place and a lap down after a difficult afternoon, 800m above the sea level. His teammate Romain Grosjean gave us a demonstration of what to expect in 2014 as his Renault engine blew up on the very first lap of the race.

Pastor Maldonado left little space for Toro Rosso’s Jean Eric Vergne on the first part of Senna S. Vergne had nowhere to go and made contact with Maldonado, forcing the Venezuelan in the spin. The incident is currently being investigated by the Stewards.