CHINESE GRAND PRIX 2011

Mark Webber admitted he was relieved to see Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel’s run of victories had come to an end after getting his own season back on track with an outstanding drive from 18th on the grid to third in Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix.

The Australian, who surrendered the drivers’ title to Vettel on the final day of last season, went in to the race mired in speculation regarding his form and his future.

But he produced a typically gutsy performance in adversity; a performance all the more remarkable since he was still 15th after 15 laps, having struggled to get through the midfield traffic while on hard tyres.

The result leaves Webber fourth in the championship, 31 points behind Vettel, who was denied a fifth successive victory by McLaren's Lewis Hamilton.

“Congratulations to Lewis. It was good that someone finally ...” Webber started before checking himself. “Of course Seb is in the same team, but he’s been on a phenomenal run and we’re all here together fighting for victories.

“It’s a shame McLaren won in a way, but also we can’t let Seb get too far away.

"It was a good day for the racing, I think, and a good day for us in terms of points for the team.”

Webber’s Red Bull team principal, Christian Horner, declared himself delighted for the 34 year-old, whose performances in the first two races of the season — fifth in Australia and fourth in Malaysia — had led to speculation that his rolling one-year contract would not be renewed.

“What a recovery from Mark,” Horner said.

“He made some great moves with Michael [Schumacher] and Fernando [Alonso] and so on and then to get the podium there at the end ... he came close last weekend and he really deserved that result today.”

Horner admitted, though, that the team had to solve their reliability issues with the KERS energy boost system, worth up to a third of a second per lap, after encountering problems with it for the second week running.

“KERS worked pretty well for the first half of the grand prix and then we became more intermittent with its usage in the latter half of the race,” he said.

“We still need to improve on it and we have got three weeks between now and Istanbul to make sure that we have got it available on every lap of the grand prix.”

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, meanwhile, cut a gloomy figure in the aftermath. The two-time world champion finished seventh after opting for a two rather than a three-stop strategy, although he said it would have made little difference either way.

“It’s very easy to choose the strategy when you have the fastest car and it’s very hard when you are slow,” he said. “We need to improve the car above everything.

"I don’t think it would have changed much.”

Alonso’s team-mate, Felipe Massa, who finished sixth, disagreed, saying a three-stop strategy would have been better but added that he was delighted to have scored a rare victory against Alonso.

“It was the best race for me this year – one of the best compared to last year as well,” he said.

“I’m very, very happy with my performance.”