Alonso wins in Bahrain on Ferrari debut

Fernando Alonso won the first race of the 2010 F1 season in Bahrain and led a Ferrari double in a great debut for the Italian team. The Bahrain Grand Prix started with Sebastian Vettel on pole and was led more than two thirds by the Red Bull drive but due to some power problems he had to settle with fourth place.

Alonso declared that there’s no better way to start the relationship between him and Ferrari  and this victory was his 22nd career victory. The runner up with 16 seconds behind was Felipe Massa who was back on track after the life threatening head injuries suffered last July in Hungary.

Lewis Hamilton completed the podium 23.1 seconds behind Alonso followed by Vettel and Nico Rosberg from Mercedes GP. Seven times world champion Michael Schumacher managed to finish in a decent position at his comeback at 41 years and he came on sixth place after three years away.

Current world champion Jenson Button also made his debut at McLaren but he finished only on the 7th place. Next points were taken by Mark Webber, Vitantonio Liuzzi and Rubens Barrichello.

With the new points system from Formula 1, Fernando Alonso got 25 points for the victory and the top 10 finishers collected points. From the new teams coming to Formula 1 in 2010 Lotus proved to be the best and they were the only ones to finish the race with a car.

[Image via Batchelor]