German driver Nico Rosberg storms to victory at Shanghai

2008 saw Lewis Hamilton of McLaren and Felipe Massa of Ferrari battle out for the title until the last lap of the very last race. For many years however, Formula One has been more of team-driver domination. There were five years of Michael Schumacher and Kimi Raikkonen with Ferrari, two of Fernando Alonso with Renault, two years of Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull and one year of Jenson Button with Brawn GP.

This year is shaping up a little different, with three different drivers winning the first three races. The F1 circus seems to have re-discovered a joy, absent in past seasons, with tyre strategy playing a dominant role for efficient use together with lighting quick and timely pit stops and the ban on blown diffusers, a key element for Vettel’s dominance during the 2011 season, winning 11 of 19 races.

Even with Nico Rosberg’s surprise pole position, none could have predicted that Mercedes, a team who has displayed poor tyre management, would require only two stops allowing Rosberg to earn a maiden victory at his 111th attempt by a staggering 20.6 seconds. To top that off, on lap 42, no fewer than eight cars would each be separated by less than a second adding additional drama and excitement at the pits. For further excitement stunning overtaking moves, established skills of respective drivers with notable examples by Hamilton’s move on Felipe Massa on lap 26 and Button’s DRS pass on Vettel into the hairpin four laps later.

Button did his best by finishing second from starting fifth, though he had to overcome heavy traffic when re-joining the pack from his slow 9.7s third stop. Hamilton finished third for a third time after starting seventh due to a grid penalty obtained for a gearbox change. Nonetheless his consistency allowed him to jump to the top of the drivers’ championship standings.

On lap 45, fans were treated to a battle between Hamilton and Mark Webber for fifth place while Button heaped pressure on Vettel for third. Three laps on, Vettel pressured Kimi Raikkonen of Lotus into running wide, allowing Button to sail through. Raikkonen proved he hasn't forgotten his form, holding on to second for much of the race. However with less than ten laps to go his fast degrading tires were holding up for too long and dropped down from second to twelfth within two laps. Seconds later Hamilton took advantage of Webber running wide to pull off yet another pass.

With one lap to go, it was Hamilton’s turn to cope with the pressure of being in a Red Bull sandwich before taking Vettel to make it a hat-trick of third places this season. The current champion struggled towards the end of the race also with tyres issues that were 24 laps old and had finished at fifth.

Fernando Alonso started where he finished, in ninth, but a poorly-judged overtaking move on Maldonado forced him wide on lap 43 and back to 11th place with Felipe Massa struggling to match the performance of his team-mate and finished a disappointing 13th.

"I tried to do my best in a very close fought race. Sure, 13th place is not something I can be happy about, but I think that as far as my race was concerned, this was a step forward compared to the first two races of the season” said Massa, who is yet to score a point this season.

The only retiree was Michael Schumacher, who was forced to stop his car on lap 15 after a poorly secured right front tyre during his pitstop. Mercedes were later fined for allowing him to leave the pit lane without a front wheel being properly attached.

"I noticed in Turn 3 that something was wrong with the front right tyre. Already by Turn 6 there was quite a bit of smoke and damage and I thought it was better to stop before I did some serious damage to the car. I don't have any hard feelings. I feel a bit sorry for one of my boys that I guess he feels responsible, but its part of the game” Schumacher told the BBC.

It was racing as it should be with paramount display of driver's skill and clever team strategies playing a key role and not technical wizardry.