2010 GERMAN GRAND PRIX

Race

Despite taking victory in the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, Alonso faced pressure heading into the second half of the season; he was forty-seven points behind Hamilton in the Drivers' Championship after scoring four points in the last two races. Alonso had been largely affected by safety car periods in Valencia and Silverstone despite his team having narrowed the performance gap on their championship rivals. However, Alonso remained upbeat about his title chances and said his team had more ... Several teams made alterations to their cars in preparation for the event. Mercedes introduced a new version of their car's rear wing which was designed to work more efficiently with their F-duct system. Ferrari brought a refinement to their exhaust system and modified their diffuser's side channels. Red Bull introduced minor improvements to their car's F-duct system and both of their drivers used a front wing specification which courted controversy at the preceding British Grand P... Elsewhere, Force India committed an error when bringing their drivers in early. Liuzzi made contact with Sutil which damaged his front wing. The team had been expecting Liuzzi to pit before Sutil, but the latter was the first to arrive into the team's pit stall. It was only after both drivers had returned to the circuit that the team realised they had accidentally placed Liuzzi's tyres on Sutil's car and Sutil's tyres on Liuzzi's. Buemi was pushed back into his garage and became the race'... Massa responded to Alonso's quick pace with his fastest lap time to increase the gap by four-tenths of a second. Button ran wide at the first corner and fell further behind sixth-place driver Webber. Hamilton set a slow time which allowed Webber to close the gap to the former. Vettel became the first driver to make a scheduled pit stop for the hard-compound tyres on the 12th lap, and rejoined in sixth in front of Kubica. It was part of a strategy by Red Bull to place him into clear air in the ho... Alguersuari overtook Glock for the 18th position on lap 17, and started to reduce the gap between himself and Senna. Button, who was still to make a pit stop, set faster lap times than other cars despite being on a worn set of soft-compound tyres. The battle between the two Ferrari drivers allowed Vettel to quickly close the gap. Alguersuari passed di Grassi to move into 16th place on the 21st lap. Alonso and Massa had caught up to slower cars by the same lap, which allowed the former to ... After passing slower cars, Vettel began to resume his battle with the Ferrari drivers. Button made a pit stop on lap 22 and reemerged in fifth position behind his teammate Hamilton. The Ferrari cars began to set faster lap times than the rest of the field as Massa started to pull away from Alonso and held a lead of three seconds over his teammate. Alonso responded to Massa's newfound pace by recording a new fastest lap of the race, a 1:18.075 on lap 28, having backed out to see how... By lap 39, Alonso had reduced the time deficit between himself and Massa as the latter was lapping the two Virgin cars. At the start of lap 40, Massa held a 1.2 second lead over Alonso, who in turn, was 5.2 seconds in front of Vettel. Hamilton in fourth place was 18.1 seconds behind, but was maintaining a steady gap to teammate Button in fifth. Webber was told by Red Bull over the radio to increase the gap to Button, because his car was suffering from an issue with its oil consumpt... The top three drivers appeared on the podium to collect their trophies and spoke to the media at a later press conference. Alonso described his race weekend as "good overall" and felt the one-two finish for Ferrari was a deserving and strong result. He said he felt that the team's motivation would drop in the event of poor finishes and stated that Ferrari would get overexcited after finishing strongly and did not see a reason to be pessimistic for the next race of the season. Massa said it... Ferrari's use of team orders , which resulted in Massa relinquishing the lead to Alonso on lap 49, risked the team's exclusion from the race results. Team principal Stefano Domenicali , Ferrari manager Massimo Rivola , and Alonso and Massa were summoned by the stewards because they were considered have transgressed Article 39.1 of the 2010 Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) Sporting Regulations, and were charged with violating Article 151c of the FIA's sporting code. T... Domenicali insisted there were no team orders and that it was Massa who chose to allow Alonso past. Alonso reaffirmed Domenicalli's statement and admitted he was surprised when Massa slowed and claimed that he felt Massa had a gearbox issue. FIA reporter Lars Österlind investigated the incident and sent a 160-page report to the World Motor Sport Council which concluded that Alonso should be given a five-second time penalty which would hand the victory to Massa. He also wanted a suspended ... The result extended Hamilton's lead in the Drivers' Championship to 14 points over Button. Vettel's third-place finish tied him with Webber in third place on 136 points, and Alonso's victory put him within 13 points of the Red Bull drivers. McLaren maintained their lead in the Constructors' Championship, although Red Bull's finish of third and sixth meant they reduced the gap by one point. Ferrari's one-two result allowed them to reduce the points deficit to Red Bull slightly. Mercedes and... Drivers who scored championship points are denoted in bold .

Qualifying

Vettel set the fastest time in the final session which clinched him the sixth pole position of his season (and his third consecutive) with a lap of 1:13.791 which was recorded on his final timed lap. Although he was happy to start on the pole he said his lap was not "100% perfect" as he drove off the circuit after he pushed hard. Vettel was joined on the grid 's front row by Alonso who was 0.002 seconds after Alonso had recorded the fastest times in the first and second sessions. Massa took thir... The fastest lap in each of the three sessions is denoted in bold .