Sebastian Vettel handed Red Bull back-to-back constructors titles with his 10th victory of the season in Korea. The newly crowned world champion grabbed the lead off Lewis Hamilton with a brilliant move at Turn 4 and never looked back as he charged over the finish line 12 seconds clear of the McLaren ace 55 laps later.
“Fantastic Seb, well done we’ve won the constructors championship,” said boss Christian Horner over the radio. “Yes, yes, yes, we’ve done it my friend,” was the champion’s response. Mirror.co.uk
Vettel, who clinched his second straight drivers’ championship at last weekend’s Japanese GP, claimed his 10th F1 victory of the season with three races remaining, meaning he still has a chance of matching Michael Schumacher’s record of 13 wins in a season. The 24-year-old Vettel is the series’ youngest two-time champion.
“Ten is a nice number,” said Vettel, who claimed his 20th career win, tying him for 12th on the all-time list with Mika Hakkinen. “It was a long, long battle and, to be honest, I didn’t know if I could keep him behind me,” Hamilton said.
Red Bull’s Mark Webber was third — securing back-to-back constructors’ titles for the team — followed by McLaren’s Jenson Button and Ferrari driver Fernando Alonso, with second through fifth tightly bunched as they crossed the line. The Associated Press
Webber added: “It was the team’s day today. It’s been a phenomenal year but I’m disappointed not to get second today. “I think at the second stop we did the worst thing, we stopped on the same lap and that was disappointing as we had some good pace to pull away from Lewis. I look forward to the next one.”
Jaime Alguersuari put in another strong performance to finish seventh, the Spaniard passing Rosberg for the position on the final lap after a couple of unsuccessful earlier attempts, while his Toro Rosso team-mate Sebastien Buemi was one place further back.
Paul di Resta completed the points scorers, ahead of his Force India team-mate Adrian Sutil, while Pastor Maldonado - who was in the mix with the Force Indias behind the safety car, was given a drive-through penalty for hitting a bollard at pit entry, and later retired.