Posted on 8th October 2012
Vettel, claimed his fourth pole in a row in Japan with a lap of 1min 30.839secs. a full .25 of a second ahead of his Red Bull team mate Webber. This was Vettel's fourth pole of the season and the 34th of his career whilst Alonso, the championship leader could only manage 7th fastest.
Jenson Button 3rd fastest suffered a five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change whilst his soon to leave McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton qualified 8th.
Local hero Sauber driver Kamui Kobayashi, Lotus driver Romain Grosjean line up on the second row, followed by Sergio Perez, Alonso. Raikkonen, Button, Hamilton and Massa completing the top 10.
Vettel leads at the first turn but a coming together on the first lap with Raikkonen sees Championship leader Fernando Alonso out the race after spinning off with a puncture. The resultant carnage also sees the exit of Rosberg, whilst Grosjean again involved in a coming together with Webber loses his nose cone.
With the safety car out, Grosjean and Webber pit, and rejoin at the back of the field, whilst Kobayashi takes advantage to move to second, with Button third.
On the restart, Vettel catches Kobayashi napping, and soon builds a good lead, Button hanging on in 3rd, Massa and Raikkonen folloing in 4th and 5th
Lap 8 sees Grosjean handed a 10 second stop-go penalty by the stewards for causing that collision at the start of the race, the Lotus driver again deemed responsible for another accident.
With 12 laps completed and the first pit stops imminent, Vettel led Kobayashi by, 7.5seconds who had a 2second gap to Button, with Massa close behind.
McLaren pitted Button on lap 13 but came out behind Ricciardo, which held up the McLaren driver allowing Kobayashi to comfortably hold second after his stop.
Massa meanwhile completed more laps on old rubber and benefitted by coming out second behind Vettel
Perez having passed Hamilton pitted on lap 15, but emerged behind the McLaren driver again, after closing on Hamilton, Perez attempted a move on Hamilton, but lost control, ending up in the gravel trap, and out of the race.
The race was now settling down, Schumacher was still battling, and meanwhile Vettel was still pushing for the fastest lap of the race, his team urging him to take it easy and “bring it homeâ€
In the final laps, Button closed to within a second of Kobayashi, but the Local hero was never really under any threat, and he finished third behind Massa and the winner Vettel.
Hamilton finished 5th ahead of Raikkonen, Hulkenberg, Maldonado, Webber, and Ricciardo with Schumacher in 11th
The F1 Circus now moves to Korea, with Alonso's lead cut to 4 points, and another terrific race in prospect.
