2010-03-24 F10 (8) Fernando Alonso BRN - Sakhir 1
The 2010 Bahrain Grand Prix was a the opening round of the 2010 Formula One season
The race was won by Fernando Alonso, his first as a Ferrari driver. His new teammate, Felipe Massa ensured a good start to the year for the team by finishing second. McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton completed the podium by finishing in third position.
Michael Schumacher's first race of his return to Formula One for the also returned team Mercedes resulted in him finishing sixth.
The three new teams – Lotus, Hispania and Virgin – did not have a very successful debut race. The race was also the first since the 1993 Australian Grand Prix not to feature refuelling during in-race pit stops.
The race also saw a return to the banning of refueling of the cars during the race, a practice which had been allowed since the 1994 Formula One season. Additionally a new points scoring system to decide the World Drivers' Championship was implemented, the most radical revamp of the system since the formation of the World Championship in 1950. The 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 system used from 2003 to 2009 was replaced by a new system which awards points to the top ten finishers on a 25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1 basis.
The first lap was otherwise clean, with Sebastian Vettel quickly converting his pole position into the race lead. Vettel continued to lead comfortably, two seconds ahead of Alonso and a further three ahead of Massa. However, he began to noticeably slow down during the latter part of the race due to a problem that was later identified within the team as a problem with a spark plug, and was quickly passed by the two Ferraris and Hamilton, and spent the rest of the race trying to hold Rosberg at bay.
Alonso went on to win the race, joining Juan Manuel Fangio, Giancarlo Baghetti, Mario Andretti, Nigel Mansell and Kimi Räikkönen as the only men to win for Ferrari on their debut. Massa finished second on his return to full-time racing after his injury at the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix
