So happy for Nico. So happy. So very, very happy.

Red Bull
Sebastian Vettel, 1st
“I think today was incredible; the pace we had was scary at some stages, I felt very, very good on the soft tyres and was able to pull out a good gap in the first couple of laps. I think it’s difficult, being an active member of the team, to put things like today into perspective. When I think of the times we’ve experienced over the last few years, it’s incredible to have a strong group of people together that believes so much in what they do. To be part of that is great and makes me proud. The car was so enjoyable on every single lap. There are not that many races when you are in complete control of the car – so it’s special. I didn’t get the maximum out of myself yesterday, but we made up for it today.”

VET – “Fucking Rocky, making me fucking rein my shit in. It’s bullshit. Why do I need to do those doughnuts at the end of the race? It’s not a celebration! It’s all my pent-up glory!! That’s the price of forcing me to contain my true potential: I’m’a gonna turn this F1 shit into some NASCAR, dick-wagglin’ malarky.”

Mark Webber, 2nd
“Seb was on another planet today and was very, very strong in the first stint. He was super quick and his tyres didn’t wear out, which is a recipe for disaster for the rest of the opposition, me included. Nico had a very good start on both Sebastian and I, but fortunately it wasn’t a long run to the first corner. We got under way from there and I attacked Nico on the first lap, but then we had to look after the tyres, so we waited and then on lap eight or nine we were in trouble with the rears. I made a good move on Nico to get back into position. It would have been good to win, but we got second and I’ll go to Austin and try and do better.”

WEB – “I wonder if I’ll look back on all this and think that, maybe, I should’ve been nicer to Adrian?”

Mercedes
Nico Rosberg, 3rd
“I had a great start to the race and was able to catch Mark off the line. I thought there might be a chance to get Seb but it wasn’t quite possible. I was able to push hard in the first stint on the option tyres but the second stint wasn’t quite as good as the car had a lot of oversteer on the primes and Mark was able to pass me. After the second stop, the set-up worked much better and we were able to set some really good lap times. We didn’t quite manage to take the challenge to the Red Bulls today but we were closer at least to one of them and hopefully we can make it happen in the last two races. As a team, we scored some great points for the Constructors’ Championship this weekend and I’m very happy about that.”

ROS – “Hey-hey, y’all! I’ll tell you one thing: the rosewater wasn’t the only thing poppin’ up on that 3rd place podium, yo! Only a few people know that when my eyes get all squinty and glazed over like that, it only means one thing: Angels. On my dick. Dancing. ‘Til I come. Why? Hammy’s tears, Hammy’s tears. Sigh.” 

Lewis Hamilton, 7th
“That was a tough race this evening for me. My race just didn’t quite come together and I’m not really sure why as I gave it my all out there. I had some problems with grip and, of course, it’s so difficult to overtake here when you are in traffic but we also need to figure out why I’m not getting the maximum performance from the car at the moment. The guys worked so hard this weekend to get my car repaired and ready for the race so it’s frustrating not to have delivered a better performance for them. A massive thank you to everyone for their efforts and it’s great that we have extended our lead for P2 in the Constructors’ Championship. All points count but Nico did a really good job today to maximise the potential of the car. Hopefully the last two races will be stronger for me and I look forward to that challenge.”

HAM – I suppose, really, that this is just God, testing me. Everyone at church who has, like, really crappy things happen to them, that’s how they rationalize it: ‘It was god’s will.’ So, that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to just keep telling myself it was God’s will that Felipe FUCKING MASSA PASSED ME. AUUUGHH!!! Oh, man. This is harder than I thought. It was God’s will. It was God’s will that MassA PassssSSEDDD MEEE.. . .. . ..AUGHH! You forsaking motherfucker!!!!!!! MASSSAAA???!!! AUGHHGH!!!!! Bless.”

Lotus
Romain Grosjean, 4th
“That was a pretty long race. I got a good start and made up two places in the first few corners, but after that I lost a lot of time behind the Force India. I could overtake him with the DRS, but he had much better top speed and could just drive straight back past at the next straight. That middle stint cost us the chance of a podium in the end, and on pace we could maybe even have pushed Mark [Webber] for second place, but that’s how it goes sometimes. It’s a shame we couldn’t make it four podiums in a row, but to come away with fourth place after a difficult couple of days is a decent result.”

GRO – “Not only are they paying me and not Kimi, but they secretly gave me his car, too.”

Kimi Raikkonen, DNF
“There was some contact in front of me through the first corner so I stuck to the inside, but unfortunately one of the Caterhams touched my front wheel and it broke the track rod. It wasn’t a heavy impact, but the angle made it worse. It’s never easy starting so far back on the grid, but after the penalty it was a better choice to help our chances in the race rather than starting from the pit lane. After a difficult start to the weekend we did well yesterday so it was a shame we couldn’t start where we qualified, but these things happen sometimes; it’s just back luck.”

RAI – “What? Eh? Sorry, I can’t hear your insipid, dumbass questions over the sound of my flip-flops heading towards the door. KIMI OUT!”

Ferrari
Fernando Alonso, 5th
“I am happy to have brought home points for the team in a race that was always going to be tough, on what has been a very difficult weekend for us. Given the gap to the top four, I certainly couldn’t have done more. Starting from further back, we knew we would find ourselves in traffic, therefore having done well at the start, I tried to overtake as much as possible. When we saw that we were always behind another car, it became impossible to think in terms of a single stop and it was clearly better to switch to two and attack. As the Mediums were holding up quite well, we thought we’d use the Softs for a short stint to try and do a series of quick laps. As for what happened with Vergne after the second pit stop, I don’t know what the stewards will say, but the rule states that if you have an equal amount of car to the other one on the track then you can use all the space. But this was only one incident in a race which, for me, was fantastic. Now, if we don’t want to give up our fight in the Constructors’ Championship, we absolutely must do better and finish the last two races on the podium.”

ALO – “You know. . . Shit, I don’t even know what to say. You know that scene in Lord of the Rings where Gandalf is being all badass to the fire demon thing? What is it? The Balrog? Anyway, I’m like Gandalf, you know? I’m a fucking wizard in this car. . . this fucking Hobbit car. And I’m being all bad ass and doing my best and then, at the last moment, right, the goddamn Balrog sucks me down that endless pit into oblivion. So frustrating. ‘Oh, but Gandalf comes back as Gandalf the White and he’s more powerful than ever!’ you say. Yeah, well, take that and second place in the WDC and stick it up your fucking LOTR freakazoid ass!”

Felipe Massa, 8th
“Today I was competitive from start to finish and pulled off a lot of passing moves with a car that handled well. It was a great race. Our strategy was based on a single stop, but when we realised that the pace was too quick for the rear tyres and the wear was greater than expected, we decided to make a second stop so as not to take any risks. Fitting the Mediums rather than the Softs was not the best decision, because the softer compound was quicker by at least a second per lap: I’d managed to do 19 laps on them in the first stint and it would not have been a problem to do the same in the final part of the race.It’s a real shame, because we could have finished at least fifth, but even if this is not the result we deserved, I am still pleased with my performance. Now we head for Texas and Brazil, two tracks that on paper should suit our car better and where I hope I can continue to be competitive.”

MAS – “Yo-ho! Still here! Fuck that Hulkenberg Fever! Get yo’self some hot Massa action for your team! Cheap!”

Force India
Paul di Resta, 6th
“It’s a great feeling to finish sixth and make the one-stop strategy work. I said yesterday that we had opted to set the car up more for the race and it really paid off today. There were times when we had to be very quick and times when we had to manage the pace and look after the tyres. Towards the end of the race I was battling with Fernando and Lewis, but it was impossible to hold Fernando back because he was on much fresher soft tyres. Lewis was on the mediums so I just focussed on getting clean exits from the hairpin and the chicane leading onto the long straights, and was able to stay ahead. The eight points are just what we needed and everybody in the team deserves credit for the big effort that has gone in this week. That’s two strong weekends in a row and we will move to Austin determined to keep up the momentum.”

RES – “Please don’t fire me.”

Adrian Sutil, 10th
“Considering that I started in P17 I have to be quite satisfied about scoring a point and I’m happy about the team result today. It’s not been an easy weekend with the problems I had during practice and qualifying, but the strategy today was the right one and we came away with a point. I was running in ninth until the last lap ahead of Perez, but by that time I had done 27 laps on the soft tyres and it was very hard to defend because I had no traction out of the slow speed corners. The points scored in the last two races have been very important for the championship position.”

SUT – Feel that hot, fucking breath on your neck McLaren? That’s motherfucking Force fucking India right up on your ass! Hope you losers find the magic pontoons or Sergio’s Uncle drives that Flecha Roja bus up from Guadalajara or some shit. ‘Cause you are about to get the beat-down from Force India! Respect!”

McLaren
Sergio Perez, 9th
“This was a very complicated race – and harder than we’d expected. I struggled a little on my first set of Prime tyres, and I’m not too sure why. We had bad rear tyre degradation and poor traction overall. We’d opted to run with minimal downforce in the hope of being able to pass other cars in the race. But, despite that, in the event I found it difficult to overtake, and the fact that I spent a lot of the race stuck in traffic therefore made things very difficult. Still, it was a positive to be able to take ninth position from Adrian [Sutil] on the very last lap – one more point for the team may not sound much but it’s always helpful. The next race is in Austin [Texas, USA]. I can’t wait to go racing again so close to my home [Mexico], and to see the people who’ve supported me so well during this difficult season.”

PER – “I can’t wait for my uncle, Paco, to get up to Austin with that bus he promised me. He’s been running it around the Mexico City GP track and swears that thing does comparable lap times to the MP4-28. Shit, it’s easier on tyres and has a little blender for margaritas and pina coladas. Which, hey, after this season in this car, we could all use a drink. . . Am I right, people?!”

Jenson Button, 12th
“You make your own luck when you start down in 12th – where first-lap congestion is inevitable – and, sure enough, there was a little bit of argy-bargy into Turn One. I duly locked-up both my front tyres, couldn’t slow the car down sufficiently, and drove into the back of Paul [di Resta], which broke my front-wing end-plate. It’s a real pity to keep on having first-lap incidents, especially when the car is working reasonably well now. I’ve been in a similar situation for the past two races, and things haven’t really gone my way. Still, I managed 44 laps on the Prime – and, in terms of getting the most out of what we had, that felt positive. So, all in all, given how far behind we were after lap two [when he made his unscheduled early pit-stop], to finish so close to 10th by the chequer wasn’t so bad.”

BUT – “I’m just sort of glad I’m British right now. Between kidney pie and Benny Hill and Eddie “The Eagle”, we’re just sort of used to putting a good face on complete and total suck. I’m not even sure how Checo is keeping his shit together. He’s always wandering around the garage, muttering about buses and his uncle and 10 peso trips to Acapulco to go foam dancing. At least I’m still the cutest F1 dri. . . . What? What’s that? Gutierrez has been voted “Cutest F1 Driver” this week??!!! Fuck.”

Williams
Pastor Maldonado, 11th
“Today was a very tough race from the perspective of trying to manage the tyres, but we managed to cope with it pretty well. I certainly feel that the pace and consistency of the car has improved with the new aero package we ran this weekend and I could feel that the car was improving as the race went on. Unfortunately I came out in to traffic after my second pitstop which meant that I couldn’t really show the improved pace we had, and in the end I had to settle for a finish just outside the points. Overall the weekend has seen some positive steps forward which will give us a boost for the next race.”

MAL – “Yeah, I came in 11th. Man, what’s this giant wad in my pocket? Oh, look! It’s 10 million American Dollars that say 11th is the new 10th. What’s that? These dollars smell like oil? Oh, I’ll find someone who wants my stinky dollars.”

Valtteri Bottas, 15th
“I don’t think P15 was really reflective of the pace we had today. My race was compromised by the first lap when I was jumped by the Caterhams who started on the option tyres and so had more grip and were able to overtake me. After the prime tyres started to work my race pace was very good and I was able to fight hard with the cars around me. The positive from this weekend is that the car is feeling better and we have definitely made some gains which is promising for the final two races.”

BOT – “‘Jumped by Caterhams. Jumped by Caterhams. Have I ever told you how I get freaked out by Kindergartners? Yeah, I have to cross the street when I see those little fuckers coming down the sidewalk. Little fucking monsters. Them and the Caterhams.”

Sauber
Esteban Gutierrez, 13th
“Obviously we were looking for a better result this weekend, so we can not be happy. The pace is there, but qualifying yesterday affected the race today. Our strategy today wasn’t ideal either. I still had some good fights going on today, which I enjoyed, so I will take those positives with me and look forward to Austin.”

GUT – “Still super cute! And not in a McLaren!”

Nico Hulkenberg, 14th
“I’m not quite sure what happened today. I had felt comfortable with the car all weekend, but from lap one I was struggling with it. All the balance and the confidence I had was gone today, and I don’t know why. I had a lot of understeer in the first two stints. I couldn’t really rotate the car, which cost a lot of lap time. Then the unsafe release during my second pit stop, which resulted in a drive through penalty, was also quite costly. Now we have to evaluate as to why the car was so different today. It is disappointing, because there was a realistic chance for points today.”

HUL – “I need to find out what the hell Massa is smoking. I heard he’s got a little bottle he uses to collect ‘Nando’s tears and he drinks that shit and it’s like he’s Kurt Russell in some fucking Disney movie!”

Toro Rosso
Daniel Ricciardo, 16th
“This was not at all the race I was hoping for. In this sport, if the start doesn’t go well, it’s hard to recover, so I want to look at the data to understand what happened. The car didn’t get off the line well and then, at Turn 1 there was a bit of chaos as I dropped back into the group behind me. I had to run wide to avoid some accidents and from then on, my race was pretty much over. At the moment, our pace is not sufficient to fight back into the top ten if something like this happens. We must see what we can do to have better starts, because when we get good ones, we have generally gone on to score points.”

RIC – “Here’s a litany of empty excuses I need to burn up before the end of this season.”

Jean-Eric Vergne, 17th
“This is a very disappointing result. To sum it up, going for a one stop strategy was the right decision, but we made the change from Soft to Medium a little bit too early, so there was no life in the tyres towards the end, just as all that group of cars came up behind me. The original plan was for a two stop, but looking at how the race was developing, we decided to take this gamble, but it didn’t pay off. I tried all I could to keep the tyres alive, but it was not enough. A shame, as I was in the points for most of the race, especially as the car felt good and I was running at a strong pace. It seems that luck is just not on my side this season, as it’s not the first time I’ve been having a good race until circumstances have worked against me. The incident with Alonso? For a while now, if a driver puts a wheel outside the track when overtaking he gets a penalty and he had four wheels outside the line. In any case, he would have passed me down the next straight as I was struggling with my tyres by then.”

VER – “Mostly what I do at this point is pretend I’m in really deep, existentialist French film and I pretend there are all these hot, American undergrads really enjoying the movie and that’s pretty much what gives my life meaning right now.”

Caterham
Giedo van der Garde, 18th
“I have to say that’s one of my best ever races. The car was great today and the work the boys did in the stops, they were really on it and that helped a lot in the race. At the start I was ahead of Raikkonen who made contact with my left rear in turn one. I nearly spun after the contact, and lost a bit of time to my teammate and Chilton, but both Charles and I passed him by the end of the second lap and then we also got Bottas. I’m obviously pleased the luck went my way this time and I made it through the first lap and from there the car was feeling great, just really well balanced. In the first stop I went from softs to mediums and I could really push everywhere – I had a bit of oversteer but nothing too bad. I was behind my teammate after the stops but had more pace and the team made the call to let me past – with clear air I could really push and opened up a gap to him right to the flag. We know we need more luck and things to happen to the cars ahead to be able to get back tenth place in the championship, but it’s still good to have finished so far ahead of our nearest rivals. We need to carry that form through for the final two races and I know that if things come our way, we can do what’s required to finish my rookie season on a really positive note.”

GAR – “Fuck yeah! Fucking happy to be here!”

Charles Pic, 19th
“The car’s been understeering all weekend and it just carried on the same today in the race. I had an ok start, passed Chilton and Bottas by the end of lap two and was immediately pulling away until the first stop on lap eight when we went from options to primes. In the second stint the car just didn’t have any balance I could work with. I was ahead of Giedo but the team told me to let him pass so I did but with the way the car felt I couldn’t get any more out of it. That was the same pretty much right to the flag – in the final stint it felt a bit better but still nowhere near enough what I’d wanted.”

PIC – “Yup, as I predicted: it was all sandy clag with some hummus and baba ganoush this weekend. All the LED lights and money in the world ain’t gonna give this shit flavor. Next race: The States! Texas! Tacos and clag! Guns and clag!”

Marussia
Jules Bianchi, 20th
“I think we are quite surprised by our performance today after we had seemed to arrive at an improvement in qualifying. It was a very long race, I have to say. The car balance was not as we expected and I had to really push very hard to keep pace with the Caterhams, which is not ideal for managing the tyres. I think we will have to have a good look at everything before we go to Austin as, in theory, our new developments had seemed positive. It has been a tough weekend so we hope for better things in the final two races.”

BIA – “Is this shit over yet? What? We’re supposed to do this 22 times next year??!!!?? Fuck.”

Max Chilton, 21st
“That was a tough race for us today. We’ve made some good progress this weekend but for some reason we were unable to show that today. The start was good – again – so well done to the Team for getting on top of that because that last few races have been very good in that respect. Into the race the car balance was difficult and we were just battling for pace. It’s a shame, because our new developments seemed positive, but they haven’t translated into the race today. On the plus side, I finished yet another race – so that’s 17 out of 17 now – and of course we still hold position in the Constructors’ Championship. I think we have a lot of work to do to get on top of this before Austin as we need two strong final races.”

CHI – “GUYS!!! FUCKING 17 IN A ROW!!!! CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS SHIT!!!????? WOOOOOO-HOOOOOOO!!!!!!!”

Pirelli
Paul Hembery, Pirelli motorsport director
“First of all, congratulations to Sebastian Vettel for winning this race. A variety of strategies were deployed, with good levels of wear and degradation on both compounds, which meant that drivers were able to complete long opening stints even on the soft tyre. Sebastian drove a masterful race to win without ever losing the lead, making the most of the fact that he had not used the medium compound at all in qualifying, leaving him with two fresh sets of mediums today. As usual we saw a high degree of track evolution and falling track temperatures over the course of the race, although perhaps not to the extent we actually anticipated.”

Hembrey – “As always: double finger to you fucking assholes blaming the tyres on your shit-ass results.”

17th to 3rd. It appears that using Kimi’s sunglasses does help you drive better. Next race, watch out assholes, I’m adopting his method of driving in flip-flops as well!

Sebastian Vettel, 1st

“First of all I would love to say thank you to the crowds. It was an unbelievable reception today and it’s a shame we are not racing here next year. I’m speechless. I crossed the line and I was empty. I took ages to think about something to say. It’s one of these moments where you want to say so many things but you can’t. It’s been such a phenomenal season. I think the team and the spirit inside the team is so strong; I said it on the radio already – it gives me so much power. It’s a pleasure to jump in the car and go out for the guys and girls and try to give it all I have. The car was fantastic today. I didn’t think about the donuts before the race today – it just happened. My engineer directed for the usual procedure, but I said ‘not this time!’ There are so many people in the main grandstand, I just had to do it. I want to say a big thank you to the team – all the people behind us. It was for sure not an easy season and even though people on the outside thought we had it in our hands, I think it was difficult. It a was tough season for me personally, to receive boos even though we haven’t done anything wrong; to overcome that and give the right answer on the track and get acceptance makes me very proud. To join people like Prost, Fangio and Michael is unbelievable. I think this is one of the best days in my life so far. There are so many people that I have to thank; I’ve always tried to listen and learn and it’s incredible to race some of the best drivers in the world.”

Translation Svcs – While we here at Translation Svcs feed on snark much like the VET-Bot 2000 feeds on, um, team spirit, I guess, we sort of feel like this was actual sincerity on Vettel’s part. Listening to him declare his love for Adrian and Cristian on the radio touched a warm and fuzzy spot on our gnarled and bitterly blackened hearts. We’re almost willing to forgive the wonderful contradiction between him saying “I always try to listen” and saying “Fuck it! I’m doing some doughnuts!!!!!!”. VET-Bot 2000, we are not sure if you are human, half-human or not-human; if you “secretly” get the better car with the magic turbo boost; or if you’re a combination of all that, PLUS just really fucking fast. . . . Either way, you clinched the WDC so, this week, we’ll be mostly nice as a way of saying congratulations.

Mark Webber,DNF
“Obviously I’m pretty disappointed with today’s race, but there is not much I can do, the alternator went wrong with very short notice so we had to stop straight away. It’s tough because we did a lot of things right this weekend, but I’ve got a smile on my face as I could not have done any more. Well done to Seb on his Championship and also to all the Team; to get a fourth title is amazing. It’s been a great job by the whole team to achieve the title four years on the trot and it has once again set itself as the benchmark for the others.”

WEB – “I’ve got a smile on my face right now because I’m a fucking professional. Shortly, I will be proceeding to a small, dark, well-insulated room where I will anger-shave my anger-whiskers. Then I will hold a koala-shaped pillow to my face and scream into it until I fall asleep.”

Christian Horner, Red Bull team principal
“To achieve four double World Championships is the culmination of an enormous amount of dedication and commitment from the whole team. For Sebastian to have joined the illustrious names of Fangio, Prost and Schumacher is an incredible achievement, especially at such a young age and it’s a privilege to work with him. It’s an enormous day for the team to have won its fourth consecutive Constructors’ World Championship. Without the dedication and determination of all the staff from all of the departments throughout the company and from all of our Partners and the backing of Dietrich Mateschitz and support of Red Bull, none of this would be possible. There’s going to be an awfully lot of happy people in Milton Keynes and Salzburg this evening. We’ve got three races to go and we’re just going to go for it. The most disappointing thing today was obviously the failure on Mark’s car when we were set for a 1-2 finish; we had a sudden alternator failure, but sometimes that’s racing. It was just desperately disappointing to happen while we were on course to achieve a 1-2 finish. I think it’s going to take quite a few days for this success to sink in and it’s important for the team to enjoy the moment – we will be pushing all the way to the chequered flag in Brazil.”

Horner – “That’s racing. Every week: that’s racing. Car’s on fire: that’s racing. Nothing to see here. Go Seb!”

Thierry Salvi, Renault support for Red Bull
“Seb showed his capacity to be very, very quick yet again and to come back to the front despite a very early pit stop. That was a demonstration. Mark pushed very hard from the beginning and was a serious rival to Seb until his failure. A huge result for the team today, with the quadruple double finally done and dusted! It’s a very proud moment for us to have contributed to these titles and to see the partnership go from strength to strength. It was not a perfect day with the alternator issue for Mark, but it doesn’t have to sour the celebrations for too long.”

Salvi – “Mark who?”

Mercedes
Nico Rosberg, 2nd
“A great job from Sebastian today and his fourth title is well deserved. For our team, it was a very important race today. We scored a lot of points and climbed back up to second place in the Constructors’ Championship. I’m quite confident that we can keep that position until the end of the season as the team is doing a great job and our car looks good but it will be a fight. I had good pace today and we really nailed the set-up here. The team did a fantastic job on the strategy and thanks to the boys for that. The only thing which didn’t work out perfectly was when I dropped behind Felipe at the start as it was not easy to overtake him on the track, but then we managed to clear him in the pits. Our target was to be the best of the rest this weekend and it worked out perfectly.”

ROS – “I’m not really sure how the hell I  came in second but, uh, hey! I’m down with it! I got past Felipe. Hey, Hammy! How did you do against Felipe? Uguughhh. . . Oh, yeah. . . .Um, does anyone have a towel? I just came again.”

Lewis Hamilton, 6th
“Massive congratulations to Seb on becoming four-time World Champion today. That’s an awesome achievement and he’s put in some incredible performances this season. I really hope we get to take the fight to him next year! Looking at my race today, it’s great that we got some good points, particularly with Nico’s podium, and that the team are back to second place. The car has been pretty good this weekend but the race was frustrating for me. I tried so hard to get past Felipe but it just wasn’t possible and unfortunately I destroyed my tyres in doing so. Finishing in sixth place is never satisfying but we’ve got three more races and we’ll keep pushing. I’m confident that we can get some more good results to keep the team in second place and we’ll keep fighting to achieve just that.”

HAM – “I am just happy to be here. Loving being in F1 with someone as talented as Seb. It’s so good to have a great relationship with Seb and that Seb knows that I totally support him and, man, am I lonely. Bless.”

Lotus
Romain Grosjean, 3rd
“If you had told me yesterday that I’d be on the podium here I would have said you were crazy! Straight from the beginning of the race I felt very comfortable on the option tyres and we looked in pretty good shape, then we fitted the mediums and the car was really quick. I lost quite a lot of time behind [Esteban] Gutierrez which maybe cost us the fight for second, but we managed to come back from that well. When I saw that I was fourth in front of [Felipe] Massa with 27 laps to go I knew it was going to be close with him as we had to take care of the tyres, plus we had an engine issue at the end of the race which made things quite tricky. In the final laps Kimi was really struggling with his tyres so I managed to pass him and luckily had enough pace to keep Felipe behind. Before the race our best prediction was fourth if we had a strong start and a perfect race, so it was an amazing result and a great performance from the team.”

GRO – “HOW DOES IT FEEL, KIMI?!!! SHOE’S ON THE OTHER FOOT NOW, BITCH!!!!!! /GRO MIC DROP/”

Kimi Raikkonen, 7th
“We ran maybe the first twenty laps with no brakes as they had overheated massively, so every time I got close to somebody I lost braking. At the end of the race I ran out of tyre performance too so it’s been a pretty disappointing day. I knew the tyres would drop off quite quickly, but there wasn’t much to lose between trying to get to the end and making an extra pit stop in terms of time lost. In the end it didn’t work.”

RAI – “Yeah, whatever. I’ve already painted all the ice dragons red. Have fun with Maldonado, Romain. You think I’m an asshole? Ask Valtteri about assholes for teammates.”

Ferrari
Felipe Massa, 4th
“That was a nice race and I am very happy, because the strategy worked. I managed to always run at a good pace, even with the Soft tyres. Here, I could have fought for the podium, but as the track evolved, some cars, such as Grosjean in the Lotus, managed to make just one stop, which was impossible for us. I lost a position to Rosberg, who came in early for his second stop, but I have to be happy with this day when we made no mistakes. Today, we lost second place in the Constructors’ classification, because Mercedes was very quick and we are well aware, that even if it won’t be easy, there are still three races and we will do our utmost right to the very end. I want to congratulate Sebastian, who deserves everything he has achieved so far. I am really happy for him, because he is a great driver and a very nice guy. From today, his name will sit alongside the greatest drivers in the history of Formula One, such as Senna, Schumacher and few others.”

MAS – “Hey, motherfuckers! Still relevant! I’m like Hulkenberg but with some gravitas. I could be like the Crash Davis of your (Yes! Your F1 team!) team! Teaching that young driver about pussy n’shit! Think about it! Fourth!”

Fernando Alonso, 11th
“Today, the problem I had on the first lap compromised my entire race, because we had to immediately change the nose and with one extra stop, without any opportunity to overtake, it was all an uphill struggle. In front of me, Webber touched someone and then me, then at turn 4 I also touched with Button. The steering felt very heavy in right hand turns and the only thing to do was pit. If you look at Webber’s race or Perez’s then I’d say our strategy was good, because when the others began to pit, those two were leading, but it’s also true that it went well for those who started on the Softs. I must congratulate Vettel, because in this, as in other sports, it’s the best that win. I’m a bit sad at not having scored points for the Constructors’ title, but now, if we want to take that second place, we have to do better in the next three races and try to always finish on the podium, at least with one car, if not both.”

ALO – “If anybody needs me, I’ll just be over in this corner, curled up in a ball.”

McLaren
Sergio Perez, 5th
“Unlike the past two or three weekends, I was finally able to enjoy a clean race without any bad luck! Fifth place is a great result for me. Without question, I have a lot of pressure on my shoulders, but it’s always sweeter when you perform well while under pressure. I’m extremely satisfied. In the closing laps, it was a fantastic feeling to get past Kimi [Raikkonen] and Lewis [Hamilton] in a single move. I just braked as late as I could for turn four to try and keep Lewis behind – and I managed to do it. It’s been a tough season, but today’s result is a promising sign and really motivates the whole workforce ahead of the last three races, where we’ll be doing our best to get more strong finishes under our belts. Finally, I want to give a big congratulations to Sebastian. He’s shown over the past few years that he’s a truly great champion. He’s had a great season and what he’s achieved is incredible. Now, I really hope we can fight against him next season!”

PER – “Si, cabron! As long as, at the end of some races, I can zip past some mo-fos whose tyres have completely gone off, I will continue to show promise! Whatever we did to the car this weekend: pontoons, some sparkly decals, whatever the fuck we did, totally worked!”

Jenson Button, 14th
“Today was just one of those days… Exiting turn four on the first lap, I got hit quite hard on the right-hand-side by Fernando [Alonso]. I don’t quite know why he couldn’t make the apex, as I’d given him loads of room, but he hit me in the side pretty hard. The contact damaged the car and damaged the wheel rim, which also gave me a puncture, although it didn’t cause me an issue until about three laps later. It was an extra shame that I was running on the medium compound tyre when I had the puncture, as that was the one you wanted to run long around here! So that incident destroyed my strategy for the rest of the afternoon. Without that contact, and the resultant puncture, I think we could have had some fun out there. It’s just a shame, because our car was quick around here – Checo showed just what was possible by driving an extremely good race. Congratulations to Seb for winning his fourth world championship. That’s very impressive – especially to win four in a row. His team did a great job, Adrian Newey demonstrated how good he is, and Seb finished it off nicely with a win.”

BUT – “Great job to Seb for getting to drive that magic car that Newey built for you, and only you, to victory. Fucker.”

Force India
Paul di Resta, 8th
“It’s great to score points here in India – the team’s home Grand Prix and a really important race for us. We took an aggressive strategy by pitting at the end of the first lap to change from softs to medium tyres – which was always the plan. After that we effectively split the race in two and I pitted again for my second set of medium tyres on lap 30. The other positive is that we’ve steadily improved the car over the last few weeks and I’m feeling more comfortable, so I think we can be optimistic of performing at a similar level in Abu Dhabi next week.”

RES – “Please don’t fire me, guys!”

Adrian Sutil, 9th
“The target was to score points so eighth and ninth places are a great result for us today. My one-stop strategy was the riskier approach and it was only during the race that we decided to go ahead with it. The medium tyres, which I started on, were performing really well and I realised that doing a one-stop race was possible. We thought that the soft tyres would only last around five laps, so I made sure I really looked after them, and in the end I managed just under twenty laps. After some difficult races recently, we showed everybody what we can achieve with some great teamwork today.”

SUT – “Hembery! After, like, ten laps on the softs, is was like fucking ‘2001: A Space Odessey’ up in this bitch! Lights and things were streaming all out of the monolith and I saw the secrets to the universe flash all around me. I felt so free! Force India!”

Toro Rosso
Daniel Ricciardo, 10th
“I am pretty pleased with today’s performance, even if during the race I thought we were looking better than a tenth place finish, especially after the first stint went well and the pace was looking good. It seemed as though we could have matched Sutil and Di Resta, so there’s a little bit of disappointment about the fact I couldn’t get past them and get a couple more points. Generally, I am pleased with what I did in the car and now we move on to Abu Dhabi, where we have a lot of support, so I hope we can give them a good result next Sunday. Vettel? Phenomenal! Particularly since the summer break, when he grabbed the title and never let anyone else look at it.”

RIC – “I suppose I should get used to the feeling of Seb taking all the nice things and me not getting to look at them.”

Jean-Eric Vergne, 13th
“I think the strategy we had was a good one, coming in very early to get rid of the Soft tyre. It could have paid off to the extent of getting into the points, but we were just too slow, even though we did everything we could. I just couldn’t do better today, so of course I am disappointed, because making up one place from my grid position is not really enough. At least we only have a few days to wait before trying again in Abu Dhabi. Vettel? What he’s done is something truly special, so congratulations.”

VER – “Blergh.”

Williams
Pastor Maldonado, 12th
“This was a better weekend for us, with the car showing better race pace which is encouraging. I had another strong start and made up a good number of places on the first lap. I was fighting hard at the end of the race to try and get us in to the top ten but unfortunately we didn’t quite make it today. We can take positives from this weekend and I feel we are getting closer to the points so hopefully we can score some more in the final three races.”

MAL – “Hey! I didn’t hit anybody! Let’s build on that momentum! Does anybody want some mad Venezuelan oil money? I promise not to run my teammate off the track too frequently!”

Valtteri Bottas, 16th
“The first lap was very slippery for me and I was sliding a lot more than other cars and lost some positions, but my pace in the first stint was getting better and I was getting more and more grip from the tyres. However I had a radio failure which meant my first pit stop was later than planned and I lost track position, and in the second stint I was fighting closely with a lot of other cars and that traffic cost us a bit of time. Our race pace was stronger than in the last few races and I felt that I was on the right strategy, but the lack of running in free air meant that I wasn’t able to capitalise on this and challenge for points.”

BOT – “Just kinda stayed back here so I wouldn’t have to smell MAL’s farts.”

Sauber
Esteban Gutierrez, 15th
“This wasn’t a great weekend, yet I gained valuable experience during the race today. Unfortunately, I made a mistake at the start and I paid for that with a drive through. We had a good pace today and I had good fights with Fernando (Alonso) and Roman (Grosjean). I enjoyed that. The car had a very good balance. At the end I struggled a bit on the options, but still I think if I avoid mistakes and we are able to qualify better we can for sure finish in the top ten again.”

GUT – “Still the cute one!”

Nico Hulkenberg, 19th
“Today I would have passed the finish line in eighth place. We don’t know yet what happened. When I was braking into the last turn something clicked and all of a sudden my brakes were gone. Something must have been broken on the car. Following that I pitted and went out again, but something wasn’t right. It is very disappointing.”

HUL – “Hulkenberg? Fever?”

Marussia
Max Chilton, 17th
“I’m so happy with my performance in that race. The start was great and with the help of my engineers we did a good job of driving around a problem that at one stage had looked like it might end in retirement. Thankfully it eased and we could set about recovering our strategy, which in the end played out very nicely for me. From the video, the circumstances of the first corner seem pretty clear – I was ahead of Van der Garde and he hit both Pic and myself with his front wing. When I looked in my mirrors I could see he had damaged his wing. Overall, it hasn’t been an entirely straightforward weekend but we have been there or thereabouts with the Caterhams’ on pace and we had it in the car today to do a good job. I’m obviously very happy to maintain my record of finishing every race but it will be an even nicer feeling if I can still be saying that in Brazil! My thanks to the team for all the hard work, which is clearly paying off. Finally, congratulations to Sebastian on a well-deserved fourth title.”

CHI – “WOOOO-HOOOOOO!! FINISHED AGAIN!!!! LOVE THIS SHIT! SO HAPPY TO BE HERE!!!!!!!! LET’S GO GOLFING.”

Jules Bianchi, 18th
“I am happy that we finished the race with both cars again but disappointed with my position to be honest. Our two strategies were very close, although the theory was that mine would be just a little quicker. The car was good and the strategy should have paid off had it not been for a problem at the first pit stop, which cost me a lot of time. At the end of the race that really made the difference. Overall we have to be pleased with the car performance and think positively about every opportunity for the team to hold position in the Championship. My best wishes to Sebastian – a great achievement for him.”

BIA – “Fucking Chilton and his goddamned positivity fucking powering him to glory. . .Well, 17th, anyway.”

Caterham
Giedo van der Garde, DNF
“I’m really disappointed my race ended so early. I made a fair start but coming out of turn one Chilton left me no room and we made contact, breaking my front wing and suspension. It’s been made really clear to us that we have to give each other room but today I wasn’t given any at all and that’s what’s finished my race before it really got going. It’s such a shame as this weekend the car’s felt really good, the balance has been there right from the first practice session and we know we have the pace on Sundays to pull away from the cars we’re fighting with. Having it all end so quickly is obviously bad, for me and everyone in the team who keep working so hard, but we can come back from this straight away next weekend in Abu Dhabi and that’s exactly what I aim to do.”

GAR – “Chilton’s so busy smiling and being happy, his eyes get all squinty and he can’t see so well and he hits me and . . . Man, I’d be angry but he’s so fucking happy.”

Charles Pic, DNF
“After the start and coming out of turn one I was ahead of Chilton and my team mate. Giedo didn’t have anywhere to go and made contact with my right rear tyre and it punctured which meant I had to come in immediately for a stop. We’d started on the soft tyres so we were always going to have to stop early, but obviously not on lap one, and with the time I’d lost with the first lap puncture I was back to where we were in Japan, having to play catch-up for the rest of the race. On the first set of mediums the car started behaving strangely and I was told to box again on lap 16. It turned out we had another puncture on the right rear and the tyre had lost a lot of pressure so we put on another new set of mediums and I pushed to close the gap to the cars ahead, but with such a big deficit it was always going to be unlikely I’d be able to catch and pass them. We gave it a go but we started losing hydraulic pressure, affecting the gearbox first, making changes harder, and then the steering started getting heavier and on lap 39 I was given the call to retire the car. My engineer explained afterwards we had to stop because of a hydraulics leak which is why we’d had problems with the gearbox and the power steering and we had to retire to stop any more problems with the rest of the car. Overall this has been a bit of a tough weekend, but we will keep fighting, next weekend and for the rest of the season.”

PIC – “Have you guys ever had the clag-naan? The shit is for reals, yo! And it just goes with everything: curried clag, clag with paneer, clag with saag. . . EVERYTHING! Where’re we going next? Abu Dhabi?! Fuck. Fucking clag with sand. Can’t wait.”

Pirelli
Paul Hembery, Pirelli motorsport director
“With a notable lap time difference between the two compounds, strategy was at the forefront of this action-packed Indian Grand Prix. We saw some very different approaches being taken all the way down the grid, which was roughly split between drivers starting on the soft and the medium tyre. We also saw many teams split their strategies between both cars, in order to cover every possibility. Sebastian Vettel’s early pit stop meant that he was able to undercut his direct rivals on the same strategy, but Webber was able to gain track position by staying out longer: which basically summed up how the different tactics worked. However, we are disappointed to see that some teams went against our recommendations and used the compounds for longer than we advised them to do. Most of all though, congratulations to Sebastian and Red Bull for their fourth consecutive double championship: a testament to their astounding capabilities in every area all year, including their skills at using the tyres and strategy to gain an advantage.”

Hembery – “Only Sutil saw through our ruse and realized that all the secrets of the universe were to be revealed to the one who pushed the softs past ten laps. Also, we slipped him a lot of LSD right before the race. That helped.”