Sebastian Vettel, already a multiple world champion driving a Red Bull, won the 2013 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix to hand his team a 100th podium finish. Mark Webber finished second and Nico Rosberg was third on Mercedes. Vettel won the race 30.8 sec ahead of his Red Bull teammate Mark Webber.
The win helped Vettel equal Alberto Ascari and Michael Schumacher’s record in 1953 and 2004, respectively, for most consecutive wins in a season. Adrian Sutil scored his last-ever World Championship points at this race, Paul di Resta also scored his final points.
The first practice session was dominated by Romain Grosjean and Lewis Hamilton, but the second session belonged to the Red Bull drivers Vettel and Webber. In the third, Vettel was two tenths of a second ahead of Webber, who himself was a hundredth of a second faster than Hamilton’s Mercedes.
However, that equation changed with Webber qualifying in pole ahead of teammate Vettel. The Mercedes drivers of Hamilton and Rosberg qualified on the second row of the grid while Fernando Alonso, the highest placed driver in the World Championship standings, failed to qualify for the final round of qualifying. Kimi Räikkönen too was excluded from qualifying and was relegated to twenty-second place on the grid having originally qualified fifth place after his car failed a floor deflection test.
During the race, Vettel, second on the grid, seized the initiative over Webber in the first corner and then held his fort till the end. Webber was unable to pass Mercedes Rosberg as well and it was further delayed when he came out behind Adrian Sutil’s Force India following his first pit stop on lap eight.
By the time he had cleared Sutil and further traffic in front of him and passed Rosberg for second place on lap 20, Webber was 27 seconds behind Vettel and the race was long over.
— N.D. Prashant, Staff Reporter
