Belgium Review: Red Bull Back in it to Win it

Published on August 29 2011 by Kevdawg

ABOVE: Vettel continued his 2011 domination to Belgium where he overhauled his total points total from 2010 with still seven rounds left to go.

The 2011 Shell Belgian GP was filled with drama with huge accidents, first corner melee, and another win in the bag for Sebastian Vettel and a one-two sweep for Red Bull. But Webber could have won the race if it hadn't been for yet another horrible start.

Speaking of starts, this one was a crazy one as Nico Rosberg leapt to the lead back from row 3. Webber dropped back to eighth, but the drama was farther back in the field. Bruno Senna, who took the place of Nick Heidfeld, who had been dropped by Renault, got into a collision with Jaime Alguersuari, who had made a great qualifying effort to start sixth. The Spanish driver was out, however, and Senna would need to pit for repairs and dropped down the field.

Then, even farther down the pack, the "Junior" teams got into battle and it wasn't pretty. Sutil hit Glock who ran into Heikki Kovalainen who hit his teammate, Trulli. The two Lotus drivers were stranded at the end of the field but continued to race.

Vettel got Rosberg on the second lap to take the lead with the help of DRS. Vettel then took of into the distance. But the tires that Pirelli offered for the race blistered really quickly so both Red Bull drivers came in to pit early on.

Buemi retired on Lap 6 with damage to his rear wing after contact with Perez. But Hamilton had the biggest shunt of all, colliding with Kobayashi and hitting the wall hard enough to knock himself out for a moment.

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SEQUENCE: Hamilton had a huge crash at Les Combes.

Vettel went on to win a very exciting Belgian Grand Prix and continued to stretch his championship lead. Webber was second, Button third.

Here are the full results.

2011 Belgian Grand Prix by Shell

Place	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Elapsed Time	Grid	Pts
1	1	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	44	1:26:44.893	1	25
2	2	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	44	+3.7 secs	3	18
3	4	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	44	+9.6 secs	13	15
4	5	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	44	+13.0 secs	8	12
5	7	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	44	+47.4 secs	24	10
6	8	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	44	+48.6 secs	5	8
7	14	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	44	+59.7 secs	15	6
8	6	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	44	+66.0 secs	4	4
9	10	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	44	+71.9 secs	10	2
10	12	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Cosworth	44	+77.6 secs	21	1
11	15	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	44	+83.9 secs	17
12	16	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	44	+91.9 secs	12
13	9	Bruno Senna	Renault	44	+92.9 secs	7
14	21	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Renault	43	+1 Lap	18
15	20	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Renault	43	+1 Lap	16
16	11	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	43	+1 Lap	14
17	25	Jerome d'Ambrosio	Virgin-Cosworth	43	+1 Lap	20
18	24	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	43	+1 Lap	19
19	23	Vitantonio Liuzzi	HRT-Cosworth	43	+1 Lap	22
DNF	17	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	27	Rear axle	9
DNF	22	Daniel Ricciardo	HRT-Cosworth	13	Mechanical	23
DNF	3	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	12	Crash	2
DNF	18	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	6	Damage	11
DNF	19	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	0	Damage	6