Formula One: Vettel wins, world raises toast to India

Indian Grand Prix winner Sebastian Vettel.

GREATER NOIDA: If you hadn't been bit by theFormula 1 bug so far, there was no escaping its big bite on Sunday. Four hours before the race's spine-tingling, ear-splitting, high-octane start at 3pm, hundreds of cars and buses from all across Delhi were making their way to Greater Noida'sBuddh International Circuit - India's latest world-class sporting facility - where reigning world champ Sebastian Vettel, fittingly emerged as the first winner. 

The buzz was unmistakable from the morning. Eager faces looked out of cars heading for India's first-ever Grand Prix. The smell of petrol fumes for once didn't start a discussion on the city's rising pollution levels. Formula 1 was set for a screaming, adrenaline-pumping debut. India delivered, and how. 

It was the first time the Indian national anthem was played in Formula 1 and the roar that went around must have sounded like music to the Jaypee Group, which has built the circuit and facilitator Mayawati. For good measure, Narain Karthikeyan finished 17th while the Sahara Force India team gained 2 points after Adrian Sutil finished ninth. 

A crowd of 95,000 - nearly double of what Saturday saw - that included cricketers MS Dhoni, VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh and Virender Sehwag, Bollywood biggies Shah Rukh Khan, Hrithik Roshan, Abhishek Bachchan, Deepika Padukone and Arjun Rampal, and corporate honchos Richard Branson, Pawan Munjal, Yogi Deveshwar, Shivinder Singh, Malvinder Singh, Vijay Mallya and Subrata Roy were all present to watch Vettel dominate the race from the moment the five red lights extinguished. 

He never let go of the lead as he roared to his 11th win this season, recording the fastest lap on the last lap. McLaren's Jenson Button could never get closer than within 2.8 seconds of the German.