Spain – Race: Maldonado offers victory to Williams

Under a beautiful sun, the 24 F1 drivers line up on the grid for the Spanish Grand Prix, the fifth round of the season. Pastor Maldonado is on pole position ahead of Fernando Alonso and the two Lotus F1 drivers, Grosjean and Räikkönen. As for tires, all drivers have chosen to start with soft tires.

At the start, Fernando Alonso takes the lead ahead of Pastor Maldonado. A small off-track excursion for Sergio Pérez after the first corner, as the Sauber driver controls his car to avoid going into the gravel. A harmless spin for Charles Pic as well.

At the end of the first lap, a great performance by Nico Rosberg, who is already in 4th place, as well as by Michael Schumacher, in 6th. A good result also for the Frenchman Jean-Eric Vergne, who is already in the points, in 10th place after starting 14th. Lewis Hamilton begins his comeback and is 20th after this first lap.

At the start of the race, Fernando Alonso is already pulling away, the Spanish driver has just over a second lead over Pastor Maldonado after 4 laps and almost a 4-second lead over Kimi Räikkönen and already a little more than a 7-second lead over Nico Rosberg, in 4th place.

Mark Webber is the first to enter the pits, after only 7 laps. The Australian driver was stuck behind Vergne’s Toro Rosso and Massa’s Ferrari. The Red Bull driver returns with Hard tires.

Lewis Hamilton continues his comeback, the McLaren driver is already in 11th position after 10 laps. At the same time, Nico Rosberg and Jenson Button enter the pits. On the 11th lap, it’s Fernando Alonso who enters the pits. The Ferrari driver goes back out on Hard tires. Romain Grosjean follows the Ferrari driver, imitated by Michael Schumacher, both men go back out on Soft tires.

Pastor Maldonado is therefore in the lead ahead of Kimi Räikkönen. Note the provisional 6th place of Heikki Kovalainen driving his Caterham during the pit stop strategies. In the 12th lap, simultaneous stops for Maldonado, who goes back out on hard tires, and Räikkönen, who goes back out on soft tires. They rejoin behind Fernando Alonso, and Lewis Hamilton finds himself already in 4th position without having stopped.

Romain Grosjean overtakes Bruno Senna at the first corner, slightly touching the Williams, and the Lotus loses a piece of its front wing. Later, on the 13th lap, it’s Michael Schumacher’s turn to try his luck, but the Mercedes driver violently crashes into Senna’s Williams, coming to a stop in the gravel while the Brazilian continues with a puncture but eventually stops by the side of the track. Both men retire from the race.

Lewis Hamilton makes his first pit stop on lap 15, but the Briton encounters another problem during his stop; he hits a wheel, causing him to jerk violently and lose more time. Once back on track, he checks in with his team, who explains the incident and tells him to focus on making up ground.

Mark Webber is experiencing a difficult race at the moment, 18th lap and already a second stop for the Australian. The Red Bull team changes the front nose as well as the tires on the RB7, Webber returns on new Hard tires.

After the first round of pit stops, Alonso leads Maldonado, Räikkönen, Grosjean, Rosberg, Vettel, Button, Kobayashi, di Resta, and Vergne. They are followed by Felipe Massa and Lewis Hamilton, who has already made significant progress.

Pastor Maldonado makes his second pit stop on the 25th lap, the Venezuelan driver leaves on Hard tires. Meanwhile, Narain Karthikeyan stopped his HRT at the end of the pit lane. Alonso stops two laps later and also leaves on Hard tires, but Pastor Maldonado takes the lead ahead of the Spanish driver, setting the fastest lap in the process.

Felipe Massa and Sebastian Vettel had been under investigation for a few laps, and both men were penalized with a drive-through each for not slowing down under the yellow flag. The Ferrari driver served his penalty immediately, unlike the German driver who had just changed his tires.

After 30 laps, overtaking is already difficult because there are a lot of rubber marbles off the racing line. As expected, tire degradation is high, and drivers are expected to make 3 or 4 pit stops.

Lewis Hamilton makes his second pit stop on the 36th lap and at the same time, Charles Pic receives a penalty for not respecting the blue flags. The French driver had notably hindered Fernando Alonso at the end of the straight.

After a good qualifying session, Charles Pic experienced a more complicated race; the Frenchman had to retire after completing 35 laps. Another retirement followed shortly, that of Sergio Pérez, who, after an issue during his pit stop, pulled over to the side of the track and retired on the 37th lap.

Third stop for Maldonado on lap 42 and the Venezuelan driver encounters a small issue during his stop, losing about two seconds. Sebastian Vettel pits on lap 43 and in addition to the tire changes, the Red Bull team changes the front nose of the reigning world champion’s RB8.

Fernando Alonso stops on the 45th lap and therefore remains on the same strategy as Maldonado, but the Spanish driver rejoins behind the Williams driver. It’s Kimi Räikkönen who takes the lead of the race driving the Lotus. However, the Finn is only a few tenths of a second ahead of Maldonado, who has made one more stop than him.

After two laps behind the Lotus, Pastor Maldonado takes advantage of the DRS zone on the main straight to overtake the Finn and regain the lead of the race as Fernando Alonso also closes in on Räikkönen. In the following lap, the Ferrari driver overtakes the Finn thanks to the DRS, while the Lotus driver seems to be switching to a 3-stop strategy.

Räikkönen stops on lap 49 to fit Hard tires for what is normally his last stop of the race unless there’s a problem. At the front, Fernando Alonso is catching up to Maldonado, now just half a second behind the Williams driver.

After his third pit stop on the 52nd lap, Romain Grosjean sets the fastest lap in the race with 1:26.250, achieving the best times in sectors 1, 2, and 3.

Kimi Räikkönen catches up to Alonso and Maldonado, but the Spanish driver slightly eases his pace to reach the end without experiencing too many issues. Räikkönen’s tires also become less effective, and the Finn catches up to the two leaders more slowly.

Pastor Maldonado wins his first Formula 1 victory. The Williams driver beats Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen to the podium. The Venezuelan driver is the 5th different driver to win this year in five Grand Prix, and Williams is the fifth different team after McLaren, Ferrari, Mercedes, and Red Bull.

Romain Grosjean finishes 4th ahead of Kamui Kobayashi, Sebastian Vettel, Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton, Jenson Button and Nico Hülkenberg, who grabs the point for 10th place but is 1 lap down from the leader.

With this victory, Maldonado also became the first Venezuelan driver to win a Formula 1 Grand Prix. And what better moment than the weekend when the Williams team was celebrating the 70th birthday of its founder, Frank Williams, to achieve this feat!

The 2012 Spanish Grand Prix Formula 1 standings