Sebastian Vettel gave Red Bull the first win of the year, storming past the competition to dominate both qualifying and the race itself. His pole position was almost eight tenths of a second faster than his nearest rivals and completely outshone teammate Mark Webber, who started on the grid third.

For the race, the only time Vettel lost the lead was when he came into the pitlane for scheduled stops and he was soon back at the front leading the pack. Red Bull admitted after the race that they hadn't implemented KERS on the cars either, so the pace was genuine... and terrifying.

Afterwards, Vettel described his day at the office: "In the second part of the race I didn't know what was going on behind Lewis, if he was under pressure or not, but towards the end of the race I could control it more. We learned a lot of things today. It's good coming here after a long winter and setting the pace."