SEBASTIAN VETTEL WINS ABU DHABI F1 GP WITH TWO PIT STOPS

INFO: JAVASCRIPT DISABLED!

Red Bull driver and newly-crowned world champion Sebastian Vettel has won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, starting on the P Zero Yellow soft compound, before running two stints on the P Zero White medium.

The majority of drivers started the race on the soft tyre. The exceptions were McLaren’s Jenson Button, the
Williams of Valtteri Bottas, Sauber’s Esteban Gutierrez, Force India’s Adrian Sutil and Lotus driver Kimi
Raikkonen – who started at the back of the grid because of a technical infringement.

Vettel took the lead from the start and made his first pit stop on lap 14, changing from the soft to the
medium compound, before rejoining in the lead. Force India’s Paul Di Resta ran the longest opening stint
on the soft tyre, 20 laps, while his team mate Sutil ran the longest first stint on the mediums, stopping on
lap 28. This strategy allowed Di Resta and Sutil to finish sixth and 10th respectively (from 11th and 17th on
the grid).

Vettel stopped again on lap 37 for more mediums without losing the lead, eventually winning from his team
mate Mark Webber by half a minute: Red Bull’s third one-two of the season and the team’s 100th podium.

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso adopted a different strategy by running a 11-lap final stint on the soft tyre, which
enabled him to overtake cars at the end and finish fifth. McLaren’s Jenson Button completed 44 laps on the

r /> medium tyre and would have completed a one-stop strategy, had he not been forced into the pits early on
with front wing damage.

Pirelli’s motorsport director Paul Hembery said: “First of all, congratulations to Sebastian Vettel for
winning this race. A variety of strategies were deployed, with good levels of wear and degradation on both
compounds, which meant that drivers were able to complete long opening stints even on the soft tyre.
Sebastian drove a masterful race to win without ever losing the lead, making the most of the fact that he
had not used the medium compound at all in qualifying, leaving him with two fresh sets of mediums today.

As usual we saw a high degree of track evolution and falling track temperatures over the course of the
race, although perhaps not to the extent we actually anticipated.”

Fastest times of the day by compound:
Soft Medium Intermediate Wet
First ALO – 1.43.434 VET – 1.43.893 N/A N/A
Second BOT – 1.44.351 GRO – 1.44.301 N/A N/A
Third SUT – 1.45.609 WEB – 1.44.364 N/A N/A
Longest stint of the race:
Medium 44 laps J Button
Soft 28 laps A Sutil
Intermediate N/A N/A
Wet N/A N/A

Truth-O-Meter:

The prediction of the Pirelli engineers for the 55-lap Abu Dhabi Grand Prix was one stop, although as it turned out most drivers stopped twice. Abu Dhabi is one of the hardest races of the year to predict a strategy for, because of the falling track temperatures over the course of the grand prix, which have a direct effect on tyre wear and degradation.

The two-stop strategy they predicted was: start on the soft, change to the medium on lap nine, and a final stint on the medium from lap 32. Vettel followed the expected pattern but went longer, stopping on laps 14 and 37.

Pit stop summary – 2013 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

Vettel: SU MN (14) MN (37) 2
Webber: SU MN (8) MN (33) 2
Rosberg: SU MN (10) MN (33) 2
Grosjean: SU MN (8) MN (37) 2
Alonso: SN MN (16) SU (44) 2
Di Resta: SN MN (20) 1
Hamilton: SU MN (7) MN (29) 2
Massa: SU MN (18) MN (38) 2
Perez: SU MN (6) MN (27) 2
Sutil: MN SN (28) 1
Maldonado: SN MN (5) MN (25) 2
Button: MN SN (2) MN (11) 2
Gutierrez: MN SN (18) MN (30) 2
Hülkenberg: SU MN (9) MN (27) DT (34) 3
Bottas: MN MN (24) SN (45) 2
Ricciardo: SU MN (7) MN (28) 2
Vergne: SN MN (17) MN (51) 2
Van Der Garde: SN MN (7) MN (33) 2
Pic: SN MN (8) MN (32) 2
Bianchi: SN MN (5) MN (31) 2
Chilton: SN MN (6) MN (32) 2
Räikkönen: MN 0 NC

The first column denotes the tyres the driver started the race on.
S = Soft compound
M = Medium compound
N = New compound
U = Used compound
NC = Not classified
DT = Drive Through
The last column gives the total amount of pit stops.

PR
03.11.2013
Yas Island (Abu Dhabi) - Dubai - Cairo