Published on http://www.spultured.com

With Ferrari’s cars easily the quickest on the circuit in last night’s Spanish Grand Prix, it’s no surprise that Fernando Alonso who started from fifth place held his head high in front of his home crowd at Catalunya and stood on the top step of the podium.

The race was once against played with Pirelli’s tyres, with the grand prix in total having 82 pit stops. Ferrari played the tyre game card flawlessly, using the four-stop strategy. The team from Lotus had great tyre conservation, deciding to only pit Kimi Raikkonen three times.

Even though Mercedes were quickest in qualifying with Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton on the front row of the grid, they both failed to make the podium after both suffering with tyre issues.

The start of the race proved once again to be fast and exciting, with Rosberg taking the jump from his British teammate Hamilton. Hamilton was lucky to make it through the first turn, locking up both of his front wheels and unfortunately flat spotting his tyres. Current world champion Sebastian Vettel managed to go around the outside of Hamilton to take second position.

The two Germans Rosberg and Vettel led the front of the field for a short period of the race, but the roaring pace of the Ferrari’s wasn’t ignored, with Alonso right behind Vettel’s Redbull Racing Renault.

It didn’t take long for Alonso to make a move on the world champion, with the Ferrari driver making a massive pass around the outside of Vettel which proved to be a vital move for the out-coming of the 66-lap race.

Rosberg was losing his battle with his hard compound tyres, which allowed Alonso to swoop in and take first position, with Vettel, Raikkonen and Massa not long after making passes on the pole-sitter.

The race was then a battle of the tyres and the teams, with Raikkonen not proving strong enough on his tyres with the three-stop strategy out in the front of the field. Fernando and the team at the Ferrari strived for the four-stop strategy and they did not look back, eventually passing Raikkonen and taking the win.

With talks of Australian Daniel Ricciardo replacing Mark Webber at the end of the season, the Toro-Rosso driver would have man a lasting impression on the team at Redbull, driving an outstanding race to make it into the points to finish in tenth place.

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso also joined his teammate on the podium, with Massa finishing third. Raikkonen managed to hold on with his old tyres and finished second, with Redbull Racing’s Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber rounding out the top five.

Pole-sitter Nico Rosberg finishing a disappointing sixth place, with his teammate who lined the front of the grid only managed 12^th place.

The Catalunya circuit saw Alonso take his 32^nd career victory and has pushed the Spaniard into third place in the championship.

Current championship standings sees Sebastian Vettel in first on 89 points, Raikkonen on 85 and Alonso sitting on 72.