Spanish GP Result: Alonso triumphs at home race

13May 2013

Ferrari fought back at the Spanish Grand Prix with a 1-3 finish, Alonso taking victory in front of his home fans. James Frankland reviews the action...

Fernando Alonso took a commanding victory at the Spanish Grand Prix to move firmly back into the title hunt, cutting Sebastian Vettel's 30-point pre-race lead to just 17 thanks to the Red Bull driver's fourth place finish.

Alonso and Vettel both moved forwards at the start of the race, taking advantage of Lewis Hamilton's pace problems in the Mercedes. Polesitter Nico Rosberg held off all advances from Vettel until the second stint, but was powerless to defend against the chasing pack for too long and slipped down to sixth at the finish, a full 68 seconds behind eventual winner Alonso.

My pre-race tip, Kimi Raikkonen, emerged as the main challenger to Alonso and attempted to win by stopping one time less, but this was a day when fresher tyres counted and Alonso, despite losing the lead after stopping for a fourth time, was able to catch and pass Raikkonen for victory in the latter stages.

Alonso's odds in the Driver's Championship shortened to 2.48 following the race, compared with 3.8 after the Bahrain Grand Prix. Conversely Vettel, who was as short as 1.93 to be this year's champion, has lengthened to 2.38. So he's still favourite, but not by much and this race demonstrated that, on a track which ought to favour Red Bull in the aerodynamic stakes, that things aren't going to be quite that easy for the Milton Keynes-based squad if they want to secure their fourth consecutive titles this year.

Raikkonen remains the best-placed outside the aforementioned duo, but Lotus really need to be converting promising qualifying positions into wins and perhaps the loss of technical director James Allison, who departed earlier in the week in advance of a rumoured move to Ferrari, will stifle the momentum of the team from Enstone.

Ferrari have taken over second place in the

Constructor's Championship with their 37-point haul from today's race, bringing their odds of victory in this market down to 2.6 in the process. There appears to be a bit of momentum swinging towards Maranello at the moment, so those odds might well be worth considering. Red Bull remain out front at 1.76, slightly higher than the 1.64 that could be had following their victory in Bahrain.