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Lewis Hamilton recorded his first hat-trick victory of his career as well as in the Chinese circuit and, in the process, led the Mercedes AMG team to another dominant victory for the third consecutive time in the 2014 season. At the end of the 54 laps, Hamilton crossed the chequered flags 18 seconds ahead of team mate Nico Rosberg, in the other silver arrows, and 23 seconds ahead of Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari - the first podium finish for the Italian team in 2014, delivered in front of new Team Principal, Marco Mattiacci. Like in the previous two races in Malaysia and Bahrain, it was a leisurely cruise for the Brit after sprinting ahead of the rest of the grid, as the Mercedes team executed a flawless two-stop strategy. Besides a mild error before his first pit stop where Hamilton slid wide at Turn 14, it was an effortless race. Rosberg recovered from a poor start to aid in Mercedes' podium dominance once again, while Alonso defended the briskly charging Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo in the closing laps to secure the last spot on the podium. The other Ferrari at the hands of Kimi Raikkonen had a quiet race and managed a best of eight after starting off the grid in 11th. Felipe Massa's impressive start off the line was short lived after trying to squeeze into a gap too small for his Williams and banged wheels with his former teammate's Ferrari. After the minor incident and a botched first pit stop which involved a mix-up of rear tyres - the Williams driver crossed the line in 15th. His teammate, Valtteri Bottas, was also lucky to survive his first corner incident after making contact with Rosberg, who had a terrible start and had to fight past Massa and Nico Hulkenberg on the first lap to get into fifth. Defending champion, Sebastian Vettel, was once again outperformed by his teammate and had to settle for fifth. McLaren had another weekend to forget after its drivers crossed the line out of points classification in 11th and 13th respectively. The F1 circus heads to Barcelona in around three weeks, with Rosberg marginally leading the drivers' championship over Hamilton and Alonso at 79, 75 and 41 points respectively. In the constructors' charts, Mercedes with 154 points are clear of Red Bull and Force India with 57 and 54 points respectively.

When Sebastian Vettel qualifies at the front, there is nothing that can stop the German from grabbing the top step on the podium. Out of 88 race starts he has with Infiniti Red Bull Racing - from Australia 2009 to Singapore 2013 - he has 22 lights to flag victories and three Grand Chelem titles (currently tied with Nelson Piquet) - meaning he has qualified in pole, won the race after leading every lap of the race and set the fastest lap of the race in the same weekend. Still his record is one more than Juan Manuel Fangio who has five world championships under his belt, but one less than the legendary Ayrton Senna and Michael Schumacher. Even Fernando Alonso, Niki Lauda and Stirling Moss only have one each and interestingly James Hunt and Kimi Raikkonen have none. As the Singapore Grand Prix concluded - minutes before 10:00pm - with fireworks lighting up the already colourful and vibrant Marina Bay CBD area with stunning backdrop from the Singapore Flyer to Marina Bay Sands and ANZ to Maybank towers and hysterical cheers from the attendees - Vettel recorded his third consecutive win this season, his third consecutive win at the street circuit and his seventh podium overall. The question remains if there is anything that could stop the German driver. Unless Adrian Newey is removed, I doubt so. The problem with F1 right now is not about the lack of overtaking or people getting bored with the same person winning - it's just that rival teams have yet to produce their own Adrian Newey including legendary ones like Scuderia Ferrari and Vodafone McLaren Mercedes. McLaren seem to be a little off pace this year while only one of the two Ferraris seem to be interested in any actual racing. Over the past two years, the sport has evolved from who is winning and fighting for the championship to who had the best recovery or who managed to finish third after a strenuous battle. As stated earlier, as soon as Vettel qualifies on the front grid - you can prepare tomorrow's sports headlines today. Even yesterday at the sixth SingTel Singapore Grand Prix, Vettel won the race after qualifying in pole with a record setting time of 1:42.841 - which is even faster than Kimi Raikkonen's lap record. Not even the tropical climate of heat and humidity or the intervention of the safety car - courtesy of Daniel Ricciardo's Toro Rosso - could hinder or delay the triple world champion from claiming another this season. After 61 laps, Vettel won by a staggering 32.6 seconds over title contender, Fernando Alonso in the Prancing Horse, who leaped from seventh at the starting grid while Kimi Raikkonen catapulted to third from starting 13th on the grid

30 years after his father claimed victory, Nico Rosberg took the highest step of the podium at the Monaco Grand Prix - fighting off stiff competition from title defender Sebastian Vettel. Rosberg - a resident of Monaco - managed to fend off Vettel till the end while Webber completed the podium despite sustained pressure from Hamilton. A pit stop strategy worked well for the Red Bull team to leap ahead of Hamilton, during the first safety car period - trigged by Massa at lap 30 who managed to replicate a crash similar to Saturday

Japanese electronics manufacturer, Casio, widely known for their calculators and G-Shock range of watches are also partners/sponsors of the Red Bull Racing team. As such they have recently announced a new model in the Edifice line of analogue metal watches. Since 2009 Casio has been an official partner for the Red Bull Racing team. The youthful image and energy of the team bundled with outstanding technology development capabilities was a perfect match for Casio and the Edifice brand concept. Designed in collaboration with the Red Bull team, the limited edition EFR-520RB reflects on the youthful and vibrant image. The 520RB is based on EFR-520 with distinctive updates that clearly tell the limited edition Red Bull piece apart. The timepiece features a multi-layered watch face and a dynamic face design built from the concept of

Right before the Malaysia Grand Prix that happened this past weekend, Red Bull Racing put on a show on the streets of Kuala Lumpur, when former F1 driver David Coulthard piloted a Red Bull Racing F1 car down Jalan Bukit Bintang, KL's equivalant of Orchard Road here. I'm sure the Malaysian F1 fans must have been delighted to experience the sights and sounds (and smells) of an F1 car in full glory, but what about us Singaporean F1 fans? Not to worry, because Red Bull Racing are also going to do the same thing right here on our sunny island. Yes, Mr. Coulthard will drive an F1 car down Orchard Road for us to savour. The pre-event run-up starts from this weekend, when the F1 car itself will be displayed outside the Marriott Hotel until the evening of April 22. There will also be festivities around Ngee Ann City, where the event will be based, and cars and games will be on display for the public. Mark the date: Sunday 24 April, and make your way down for this rare experience to see an F1 car doing its thing, up close and personal. It is open to the public, so make sure you don't miss out.

Okay people, the second race of the 2011 Formula 1 Grand Prix had just concluded and reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel has won the 13th Malaysian Grand Prix held on Sunday, the 10th of April 2011. Two races on and Vettel is faultless to date. After Melbourne a couple of weeks ago he has done it again. Second place went to McLaren's Jenson Button and third place to Nick Heidfield of Renault, who must have surprised some F1 pundits as he was a last minute replacement for Robert Kubica, who suffered a pre-season rally car accident that was pretty bad. The top 10 grid positions at the start was as follows: 1.Vettel, 2.Hamilton, 3.Webber, 4.Button, 5.Alonso, 6.Heidfeld, 7.Massa, 8.Petrov, 9.Rosberg and finally, 10.Kobayashi. The race started off with concerns of rain but as the lights went out everyone was moving in on everyone. Third grid spot Mark Webber had a fault with his KERS and was overtaken by quite a few people behind him till he ended up ninth. Michael Schumacher from eleventh ended up eighth. Heidfield from sixth up to second place. I suppose the amazing thing was there was no major accidents or damage towards all the participants with the exception of Rubens Barrichello who unluckily suffered an early tire puncture. One of the newer drivers, Kamui Kobayashi, driving the Sauber Ferrari drove spiritedly. I suppose this was to make up for Sauber's disqualification in Melbourne for an illegal sized rear wing. He was in a skirmish from the start. On Lap 4 to Lap10 he was involved in a scuffle for position with Mark Webber . It only ended when Webber pitted for tires. This was one of the first few tire changes of the race due to everyone predicting that it was going to rain soon. By Lap 12 just about everyone came in as there was sign of rain on the track. It did rain but those that thought it was going to be a long and heavy one were disappointed. Those that changed to intermediates or wets must have been truly disappointed as it rained lightly and it dried up quickly due to the heat on the track. It was a little chaotic but nothing really dramatic happened. I suppose some teams wanted rain to even up the playing field. That didn't happen and things were seemingly the same from this point onwards. The only piece of accident excitement that happened was when Vitaly Petrov driving the Renault went airborne after running wide and then crashing. There wasn't any real threat towards race leader Sebastian Vettel at all throughout the race. At the very best, Lewis Hamilton, who was second behind Vettel tried a push but he was at best, 6 seconds behind. This attempt was thwarted when Hamilton's car suffered problems with his left tire. Hamilton's troubles left him with a seventh placing at the end of the race. Sebastian Vettel/Red Bull had won a rain free Malaysian Grand Prix. Jenson Button finished second some 3 seconds behind with Heidfield, Webber, Massa and Alonso coming up after that. It was quite a good race that showed off a lot of Pirelli tire changes -with three to four tire changes due to the teams unsure whether it was going to rain or not and also because the tires were temperamental with some strange handling characteristics. It looks like Pirelli is still getting some slack for their tires in their first year of being the sole tire supplier in F1. Some also had problems with the DRS wings and some had KERS that decided to take a holiday instead of working on the track. But sometimes, especially during Formula 1, it is better for us viewers, fans and enthusiasts that things don't go as planned. But can I add some non-race issues to this year's Malaysian Grand Prix at Sepang? The first is that if you drove there from Kuala Lumpur you'd expect a 10 minute drive from the toll booth as you exit the ELITE highway. But what I cannot fathom is how can things get so bad in the middle of nowhere (Yes, Sepang IS in the middle of nowhere) you need over an hour to park your car and it isn't close to the track. Then you add the humidity and overall temperature to the situation it gets close to unbearable. And secondly, parking during F1 events are usually expensive, but a jump from RM5 to RM50? That's a tenfold increase. And if most are aware, a successful event needs regular people to fill up an event and local Malaysians do not earn in Euro, US Dollars or even Singapore Dollars. I can bet you that the locals will stay away from next year's F1 because of these two issues. Imagine battling through the traffic jam and then reaching the parking only to find out that it costs a bomb. You already know that a cheap 'night market' standard burger will not cost RM1.50 but at least RM5-10. It may be cheap to the tourists from Europe but as I said, its the locals who actually make up most of the crowd on the hillstands and cheaper grandstands. The Malaysian man on the street who drives a normal Perodua or a Proton to Sepang isn't too happy actually. Oh, by the way, it is great to see Ol' man Schumacher still able to duke it out with the younger boys. Ninth position is pretty good in my opinion. Makes a good role model for people in their forties (which is actually just around the corner for yours truly). BUT...This isn't the end. Both Fernando Alonso of Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton of McLaren were each handed a 20 second penalty for overly aggressive driving against each other. Their jostle for third place was actually quite a jostle. Alonso's front wing made contact with Hamilton's car and forced Alonso to the pits to finish in sixth as well as forcing the stewards to slap him with the penalty. Hamilton's penalty came as a result of very aggressive defensive driving on the previous lap. But since both were given penalties, but the race results have not changed as somehow both of them had quite a buffer from the car right behind them. Look towards the end of this article for the official results. The ones below were the results at the end of the race not at the end of the race stewards final decision. Actually they shouldn't have been given any penalty as it did make the race slightly more interesting. Somehow racing as if their lives depended on it isn't allowed anymore. Race Results 01. Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1h37:39.832 02. Button McLaren-Mercedes + 3.261 03. Heidfeld Renault + 25.075 04. Webber Red Bull-Renault + 26.384 05. Massa Ferrari + 36.958 06. Alonso Ferrari + 37.248 07. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes + 49.957 08. Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari + 1:07.239 09. Schumacher Mercedes + 1:24.896 10. Di Resta Force India-Mercedes + 1:31.563 11. Sutil Force India-Mercedes + 1:45.000 12. Rosberg Mercedes + 1 lap 13. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 14. Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 15. Kovalainen Lotus-Renault + 1 lap 16. Glock Virgin-Cosworth + 2 laps 17. Petrov Renault + 4 laps Not classified/retirements: Liuzzi HRT-Cosworth 47 D'Ambrosio Virgin-Cosworth 43 Trulli Lotus-Renault 32 Perez Sauber-Ferrari 24 Barrichello Williams-Cosworth 23 Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 15 Maldonado Williams-Cosworth 9 Revised Results 01. Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1h37:39.832 02. Button McLaren-Mercedes + 3.261 03. Heidfeld Renault + 25.075 04. Webber Red Bull-Renault + 26.384 05. Massa Ferrari + 36.958 06. Alonso Ferrari + 57.248 07. Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari + 1:07.239 08. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes + 69.957 09. Schumacher Mercedes + 1:24.896 10. Di Resta Force India-Mercedes + 1:31.563 11. Sutil Force India-Mercedes + 1:45.000 12. Rosberg Mercedes + 1 lap 13. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 14. Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 15. Kovalainen Lotus-Renault + 1 lap 16. Glock Virgin-Cosworth + 2 laps 17. Petrov Renault + 4 laps photo source: planetf1

The 2011 FIA Formula 1 Grand Pirx began at Melbourne, Australia on the 27th of March with a victory to reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel and his team, Red Bull Racing. He started from pole and basically took the lead from the start with a minor challenge from Lewis Hamilton of McLaren Mercedes who came in second in front of Vitaly Petrov of Renault. This race started without much excitement and suspense with only Rubens Barrichello losing it on the gravel on turn 3 and then Michael Schumacher suffering from a puncture. This race also marks the first race in which Pirelli is the tire supplier and I have to say that the tires weren't as bad as they were reported to be during pre-season tire tests. And back to super senior Schumacher, the punctured tire due to being tagged by J. Aguersuari during the first few corners caused damage to his car's floor causing him to retire after around 20 or so laps. There was some surprise to see Lewis Hamilton coming in second when it seemed that the McLaren was slightly down in lap times during initial tests. He manged to keep Vettel in sight and exchanged fastest laps times with Vettel throughout the race. Of course it still wasn't enough for him to actually get absolutely close for neck to neck racing. But this is only the first race and things change really quickly in Formula 1. There was a slight problem for Hamilton during the race though, the front skid plate at the bottom of his car came loose and started scraping the tarmac. One important ruling after completing the race is that the skid plate has a certain level of thickness left in them and if it got too thin, the FIA stewards would have deemed the car was running lower than the prescribed ride height. So far, no news on this would mean that Hamilton is secure in his second place. For me the man who had a heck of a race must have been Fernando Alonso of Ferrari. At the end of the first lap he was placed 9th. He managed to claw right up to 4th position at the end of the race with a pit stop jump in position over Red Bull's Mark Webber. He was only a second adrift of 3rd place Petrov and if the race went a few laps longer could have taken that position. The other Ferrari driver, Filipe Massa finished in 9th. I suppose this was a decent start for most of the teams. Red Bull's victory is not surprise with Alonso of Ferrari stating that Vettel's driving was from another planet. What surprised me was the performance of the Lotus Renault. It also marked Petrov's first podium finish and a first podium finish for the Renault-Lotus team-up. It also looks like THIS Lotus team is the one I'd put my money on instead of the one that's now called Team Lotus, run by AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandez. Oh yes, there was a disqualification for the Sauber team. Both cars were deemed to have run illegal rear wings causing a change in the final race results. Quite sad news as one Sauber finished 7th. I suppose sometimes the teams try too hard to interpret the rules and it falls flat on their faces. This race also marks more use of the KERS energy recovery system for that extra push during overtaking and down on the straights as well as the use (by some of the teams) of something called the DRS or drag reduction system, which to my understanding is pretty simple technology. This is one of the big changes in Formula 1 this year whereby the cars can have an electronically movable rear wing that (obviously) reduces drag and theoretically will assist overtaking during the course of a race. The DRS utilized the on track electronic timing system at designated points on the circuit, when the trailing car is within one second of the car in front the system will be armed and the driver will have access to the DRS. He will not however be able to use the system until another designated point of the track around 600 metres before the next corner. The last point is subject to ongoing adjustment as the system is bedded in. There will be markings on the circuit to indicate the points where the timing assessment is made and where the driver may use the system to assist spectators and TV viewers. All for the sake of entertainment I suppose. Whatever the case, the F1 circus moves over the Sepang, Malaysia. Race weekend is on th 8th, 9th and 10th of April 2011. Results 01. Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1h29:30.259 2. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes + 22.297 3. Petrov Renault + 30.560 4. Alonso Ferrari + 31.772 5. Webber Red Bull-Renault + 38.171 6. Button McLaren-Mercedes + 54.300 7. Perez Sauber-Ferrari + 1:05.800 8. Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari + 1:16.800 9. Massa Ferrari + 1:25.100 10. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 11. Sutil Force India-Mercedes + 1 lap 12. Di Resta Force India-Mercedes + 1 lap 13. Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap 14. Heidfeld Renault + 1 lap 15. Trulli Lotus-Renault + 2 laps 16. D'Ambrosio Virgin-Cosworth + 3 laps Not classified/retirements: Glock Virgin-Cosworth 50 Barrichello Williams-Cosworth 49 Rosberg Mercedes 22 Kovalainen Lotus-Renault 19 Schumacher Mercedes 19 Maldonado Williams-Cosworth 10 Revised results 1. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull 2. Lewis Hamilton McLaren 3. Vitaly Petrov Renault 4. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 5. Mark Webber Red Bull 6. Jenson Button McLaren 7. Felipe Massa Ferrari 8. Sebastien Buemi Toro Rosso 9. Adrian Sutil Force India 10. Paul di Resta Force India 11. Jaime Alguersuari Toro Rosso 12. Nick Heidfeld Renault 13. Jarno Trulli Lotus 14. Jerome D'Ambrosio Virgin Not classified/retirements/disqualified: Sergio Perez Sauber 58

[extract] And Sebastian Vettel finally wins a race in 2010, after three Formula 1 GPs. His win and Mark Webber