On the Button

Phil: Vettel might have qualified on pole, but almost from the off it was clear one of the McLarens would win the race. But for most of the race, it looked like it was going to be the other one.

In changeable conditions, Lewis Hamilton pounced on Vettel when he slid off the track in the early laps, and by the end of the first round of pitstops, when almost the whole field came in to change from inters to slicks, Jenson Button had also passed Vettel.

A few laps later, Nick Heidfeld added to his collection of spectacular exits from races (running over his own front wing in Canada, being shunted into a polystyrene advert by Buemi in Germany) when he had to leap from his burning Renault, which had caught fire by being held up in the pits with no air flow to cool it. There was then a small explosion from the sidepod (the Renault's exhaust comes out in front of the sidepod and is then channelled over and under it for aerodynamic reasons) and the remains of Heidfeld's car finally nearly collected the world champion, Vettel, as it was towed the wrong way up the pit lane.

Paradoxically, this triggered a rush for the pits as the teams feared the safety car would be called out, meaning that almost the entire field had to avoid Heidfeld's car in the pit lane exit. After this second round of pitstops, Hamilton was leading and on the option tyre, which meant he'd have to pit again, and Button was second and on the prime, which meant he probably wouldn't have to pit again.

It looked like a classic case of McLaren hedging their bets, ensuring they'd get a one-two whatever tyre strategy turned out to be right. Then it began to rain again. Hamilton, normally the class of the field in the rain, spun, then forced Paul di Resta on to the grass when rejoining the race. Button took the lead, then lost it to Hamilton on the same lap when he had an incident of his own. Hamilton, the first McLaren to pass the pit lane exit, came in for inters.

Then it stopped raining. Hamilton was now on the wrong tyres, and had to pit again. To really ruin his race, he got a drive through penalty for impeding di Resta after his spin. Button took the win, followed by Vettel who was the only other man on the right strategy. Button and Vettel pitted three times each, but Hamilton had to pit six times, if you include the penalty. He finished fourth, 48s behind Button, having done well to pass Webber and Massa in the dying laps.

It was Jenson's 200th race and came five years after his maiden win at the same track. But because of his two DNFs at Silverstone and the Nurburgring, he's still only 5th in the title chase. Importantly, despite having won only one of the last five races, Vettel finished ahead of his three closest title challengers and is now 85 points clear of his nearest rival, his teammate Webber, with 8 races to go. By my calculations, he need only finish third in each race for the rest of the season to be world champion again.

It might be more Jonathan Legard than Murray Walker, but there's my race summary done.