• European Grand Prix

Hamilton forced to settle for second as Vettel triumphs

Sebastian Vettel held off Lewis Hamilton at the start and end of the race © Getty Images

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Sebastian Vettel withstood a late charge by Lewis Hamilton to win an incident-packed European Grand Prix in Valencia as Jenson Button took a deserved third.

The results may yet change subject to a post-race investigation involving Button, Barrichello, Hulkenberg, Petrov and a whole host of other cars for going too fast under safety car conditions.

Hamilton got the jump on Mark Webber at the start as the Australian opened the door into the first corner and also allowed the Ferraris of Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa to pass.

Things soon got worse for the Australian, who quickly dropped back to ninth seemingly struggling badly for grip with his tyres.

If things weren't bad enough, Webber got things all wrong on lap 10 in an attempt to make up ground after an early stop for tyres. The Australian slipstreamed Heikki Kovalainen's Lotus but clipped the back of his car as he moved across, launching his Red Bull into the air before landing upside-down and smashing into the barriers. In an amazing testimony to the strength of modern-day Formula One cars, Webber climbed nonchalantly from his now upright car and walked away mercifully unscathed.

When the dust settled after a lengthy safety car period, Hamilton continued to pressure Vettel but his chances were soon dented when he was given a drive through penalty for overtaking the safety car before the line. Despite the setback, Hamilton still found himself in second after serving his penalty and continued to reel in the Red Bull to finish seven seconds adrift at the finish.

Jenson Button made the most of the safety car period to work his way up to fourth behind the still to pit Kamui Kobayashi and he gained a further place to end a productive day on the podium after the Japanese driver's late stop.

Rubens Barrichello ended an impressive weekend by finishing fourth ahead of Robert Kubica's Renault and Adrian Sutil's Force India.

The Ferrari duo of Alonso and Massa, despite their impressive start, lost ground in the safety car shake-up, eventually finishing 9th and 14th respectively.

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