Vettel wins and takes 4th Championship at India

F1 Grand Prix, GP India, Buddh International Circuit

Sebastian Vettel has utterly dominated the Indian Grand Prix in a car that had no equal at the Indian Grand Prix. As team mate Mark Webber dropped out from second with an alternator failure, Rosberg finished second and Grosjean third.

The Buddh Circuit is again surrounded with fog at the start of the race. Apart from that, the weather is fine though.

As the lights went out, Webber has a troubled start once again. Raikkonen passed him through the outside of turn 1, surprising Webber who has to take avoiding action while accellerating out of the corner. This in turn caught out Alonso who was also just trying to get past Webber on the inside. The move clipped Alonso's left front wing endplate, following which Alonso hit Button as well as the Ferrari man avoided a Toro Rosso in turn 3. Button in the event lost some pace and dropped down to 14th place.

Massa meanwhile managed to get past both Mercedes and by turn 5 is in second place, second only to Vettel.

Vettel quickly pulled a gap of 3 seconds to Massa, but at the end of the second lap he's already in the pits to change to medium tyres. Alonso meanwhile also pitted to take on a new front wing after assessing the downforce deficit is too big.

By lap 6, positions are Massa, ahead of Rosberg, Hamilton, Webber (having re-passed Raikkonen), Perez, Ricciardo, Sutil, Grosjean, Button, Maldonado. Vettel is 14th while Alonso is 19th.

On lap 8 Roisberg pits to change to the meidums, just like Raikkonen. The latter's stop however took 6 seconds and put him down into 6th, just ahead of Button who pitted one lap earlier to susprisingly change to softs.

Massa and Hamilton pitted on lap 9, with Massa rejoining just ahead of Rosberg while Hamilton is behind his teammate.

Webber meanwhile is posting fastest laps as Vettel is steadily progressing through the field. By lap 13 he moved back up to 4th. The difference between the two is now about 14 seconds.

On lap 13, Grosjean is the last of the soft tyre started to make his first pitstop. He was 4th and drops back to 15th, one second behind Alonso.

By lap 16, Webber still leads, 7 seconds ahead of ¨Perez. The McLaren is however losing nearly a second a lap to the leader, while Vettel is also rapidly closing in on him.

On lap 29, Webber pits from the lead to change to option tyres. Perez does the same from P3. Rosberg pitted one lap earlier after being unable to get past Massa. This moved Hamilton up one spot and he as well is soon challenging the Ferrari. Perez then also slots in behind that pack after his stop and gets past the Mercedes, mostly thanks to his brand new tyres.

On lap 31 Alonso pits to change on options, and one lap later Vettel is also in to get another set of prime tyres.

4 laps later, Webber switches back to the mediums, and back on track is 12 seconds down on Vettel.

On lap 41, Webber Indian Grand Prix is done as he pulls his car over with an alternator failure. The car was running still fine, but Webber was asked to stop the car as soon as possible.

Afther that retirement, Sutil went into the pits for his first pitstop, changing from medium to soft. He has 18 laps to go on his final stint.

On lap 45, with 15 laps to go, positions are VET RAI ROS GRO MAS HAM PER HUL DIR SUT BOT GUT RIC ALO MAL BUT VER CHI BIA.

Webber's retirement also meant that Mercedes will provisionally move ahead of Ferrari in the Constructors' Championship. Massa is told to attack Grosjean towards the end of the race. Alonso meanwhile is still out of the points in 14th, but nonetheless close behind Bottas, Ricciarod and Sutil.

On lap 49 Ricciardo makes a move on Bottas in turn 4, a pass that Alonso gladly used to sneak ahead of the Williams as well.

At Lotus a dificult situation arises for Raikkonen. The Finn is 2 seconds aheado of Rosberg while running nearly a second a lap slower due to very very old tyres. One lap later it's done already, but at this point in the race it looks unlikely that Raikkonen is going to be pitted again. He's going slower and slower and if far beyong the recommended usage of the Pirellis.

On lap 54, 6 laps from the end Hulkenberg stops, changing to options. He returned to the pits one lap later to abandon the race with an issue on the car.

By lap 57 Grosjean and Massa have caught up with Raikkonen, and after a failed passing attempt is allowed to pass Raikkonen thanks to a team order. Massa profits immediately and sneaks into the gap to move up a place as well.

One lap later Hamilton and Perez has caught Raikkonen as wel. On the straight, both cars got ahead of the struggling Lotus, with Perez actually getting the upper hand, moving up into 5th.

2 laps from the end Raikkonen eventually gets into the pits for another stop, coming back on track just ahead of Di Resta. The stop didn't lose him any positions and the team probably decided it was the safest thing to do.

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Vettel meanwhile utterly dominated this race and secured his fourth consecutive World Championship. Raikkonen meanwhile did manage to take away the hat-trick from Vettel as that final stop allowed him to put in a qualifying lap in the last lap of the race.