McLaren duo claim podium positions with Sebastian Vettel crashing the party

As the five red lights went off signalling the start of yet another Formula One season with Melbourne yesterday, pole setter Lewis Hamilton was quickly outrun by Jenson Button into the first corner and he defended his position since.

Even with the safety car called out on lap 37 courtesy of Vitaly Petrov's Caterham halting on the pit straight, Button seemed determined and quick, with his team mate Lewis Hamilton who was mostly sandwiched between the two red bulls battle his own.

McLaren could have done with an earlier stop for Hamilton as he was struggling
to manage tyre degradation compared to Button.

When the race restarted, Button even with cold tyres pulled in a decent lead over Vettel displaying the quality of the McLaren. Mark Webber dropped to ninth in the field at the start, and fought his way through the grid to give Hamilton a challenge by filling his mirrors on the last few laps of the race.

Vettel displayed a strong performance and the team's clever tactics helped gain a position under the safety car period. Vettel stayed out on the track while the McLaren duo pitted moments before the safety car’s arrival.

With the McLarens obeying speed limit, Vettel entered the pits
and emerged ahead of Hamilton.

Ferrari roped in a mixed performance with Fernando Alonso finishing a strong fifth though starting mid field and Felipe Massa crashing out with Bruno Senna on lap 48.

Kamui Kobayashi and Kimi Raikkonen, provided the most entertainment during the closing lap where Pastor Maldonado crashed out from sixth and Nico Rosberg and Sergio Perez made contact causing them to drop back through the pack.

Perez managed to recover to eighth while Rosberg did a best for 12^th.

Behind the two McLarens, Michael Schumacher made a good start to get ahead
of Romain Grosjean, but on lap 11, went wide through the first corner trying to
defend his position from Vettel. Eventually at the end of the lap he retired with a gearbox problem.

Romain Grosjean on the other hand ended up making contact with Maldonado at turn 13 eventually damaging the Lotus' suspension and putting it out of the race. 

Williams' hopes of gaining solid points were dashed when Maldonado’s FW34 slammed into the wall two thirds of a lap from finish.

Besides showing impressive pace, Maldonado rocketed through the field and was able to put pressure on Alonso in fifth. The Ferrari was struggling with tyre degradation especially over the closing stages of the action filled eventful race with the F1 circus coming over to Sepang Malaysia this weekend.