F1: Grand Prix of Europe 2011 - Can anything stop Vettel now?

Vettel is creaming the opposition. Mark Webber, a driver of supreme ability, can't make the same car do the same things, even when he is not afflicted with niggling problems such as the gearbox issue that dropped him half-a-minute in the final laps of the race.

Around Valencia, Button held on for dear-life as his McLaren bounced around, the aerodynamics unable to get the airflow they needed. Hamilton muscled his car around more, but always on the edge of breaking it. When the brakes overheated and he was told to look after them, his response was "I can't go any slower." When he was told it was OK to push, he said "I can't go any faster." That he tucked in behind Alonso - who seems to have tamed the prancing horse - owed much to Massa's pit crew who fumbled a stop, cost the second Ferrari five seconds which was almost exactly the time Hamilton managed to stay ahead of him.

Schumacher slid into Petrov, came off worse, had to pit for a new nose and eventually finished 17th. But the most startling aspect of that was Schumacher's reaction: " I locked the front wheel and slipped into him, which was clearly my mistake." Has he been taking PR lessons? Or is the recent firmness of the stewards to what often appear to be racing incidents beginning to make their mark on even the hardened drivers?

There were two especially interesting aspects to this race: first, there were no DNFs: all 24 starters finished; secondly, there were far less marbles - despite the twisty nature of the street circuit, than at previous races meaning that the racing line was wider and therefore overtaking was less risky.

Webber says he made a mistake at the last pit stop - he was concerned as to the performance of the harder "prime" tyre which had shown a significant performance difference compared to the softer Option tyre in practice. So he stayed on worn rubber until the gap between the two narrowed. But it turned out that, in race conditions, especially on the out lap, the prime was quicker than expected and Webber is sure that his decision awarded second place to Alonso: other than that, the Aussie says it was his best race of the season, that the car did as he asked it (a novelty) at the track where he went spectacularly aerobatic last year.

Button on the other hand was in an uncharacteristic moany mood: all the more obvious after his elation in Montreal. For Button, "the highlight of the race for me" was passing Rosberg who had held him up for several laps after Button was squeezed out on the first corner. "I didn’t have enough straight-line speed to be able to overtake him easily, but I braked really late and got him into Turn Two, which I don’t think he was expecting." Aside from that, both McLaren drivers complained that the car didn't like the tyres, then Button's KERS went off. He was, he said "surprised" to finish only eight seconds behind Massa's Ferrari.

But the star performer was Torro Rosso's Jaime Alguersuari. Starting in 18th, he made less pit stops than anyone else, rove a slower car with worn out tyres using every bit as much commitment as those with far more experience. He finished just behind Rosberg who had passed him only as his tyres all but gave up any pretence at gripping the track. He credits his win to the team saying "It definitely paid off to concentrate on race set-up," a hint to a decision to compromise qualifying for race pace. On a street circuit, where overtaking is difficult, that would mean buying time with less pit-stops and inheriting places from those in the pits or in the wall. It was a brave gamble and Alguersuari's humility belies his supreme contribution.