Safety car rule infringements have led to nine drivers slapped with post-race penalties from the stewards at the European GP. They are Jenson Button, Rubens Barrichello, Nico Hulkenberg, Robert Kubica, Vitaly Petrov, Adrian Sutil, Vitantonio Liuzzi, Sebastien Buemi and Pedro de la Rosa.

The abovementioned drivers will have five seconds added to their final race time for speeding under the safety car during their in-laps prior to pitting. The Mercedes SLS AMG was called into action following Mark Webber’s dramatic crash in the early stages of the Valencia race. In a separate incident, Virgin’s Timo Glock has had 20 seconds added to his race time for ignoring blue flags.

As a result of this, home favourite Fernando Alonso moves up a place to eighth, with Sebastian Buemi of Toro Rosso dropping to ninth, while Mercedes GP’s Nico Rosberg picks up a point for tenth at the expense of De la Rosa of Sauber.

Pole sitter Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull has picked up his first win since the Malaysian GP in Valencia, Spain. The German crossed the finish line ahead of Lewis Hamilton who was closing the gap in the final stages of the race. The final podium position went to Hamilton’s team mate Jenson Button.

The home of this year’s European GP gave viewers a rather dramatic race especially with a horrifying accident that involved Red Bull’s Mark Webber and Lotus’ Heikki Kovalainen. The accident spawned a Safety Car situation which itself was showered with controversy and it substantially affected the outcome of the race, especially from fourth place and below.

Williams’ Rubens Barrichello finished in fourth ahead of Renault’s Robert Kubica and Force India’s Adrian Sutil. Seventh place went to Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi who drove a sensational race. The sole Japanese driver of the season even overtook Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Buemi at the last corner on the final lap. Buemi settled in eight while Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso only managed to go home in ninth, although he had a good chance of finishing in the podium, before the Safety Car situation that is. The final top ten position went to other Sauber driver, Pedro de la Rosa which means both the Saubers finished in the points today.

Lotus Racing didn’t have anything much to celebrate about on its 500th race, if you take into account Lotus’ previous campaigns. Jarno Trulli finished the race but did so in last place, 21st. The Italian had some problems with his car and had to make several pitstops. Only three drivers retired today including Williams’ Nico Hulkenberg who stopped with about eight laps remaining. The other two were Hekki Kovalainen and Mark Webber. As mentioned above they were involved in a massive accident.

Webber, fresh from a pitstop was attempting to overtake Kovalainen but as he flicked his car out of a slip stream, his Red Bull hit the back of the Lotus and before you knew it his car went airborne and landed head down. The Red Bull then fell on its tires and went straight into a barrier. Kovalainen on the other hand had missing front and rear wings. More spectacular than the accident itself was the fact that Webber was able to walk away from the massive crash. This happened early in race and the Safety Car was deployed.

As the Safety Car was coming out of the pits, Lewis Hamilton overtook it leaving the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso behind. The Ferrari’s were running high-up in the field before the SLS AMG was deployed. Hamilton’s move came to the Steward’s attention and he was slapped with a drive through penalty later in the race. But the penalty didn’t really do much damage as the Brit maintained his second place and Alonso was definitely frustrated about this.

Also when the Safety Car was deployed some teams managed to make pit stops right away which brought them forward in the field. Unfortunately both Ferrari and Mercedes failed to capitalize on this and only managed to pit while spending time behind the Safety Car. This pushed them further down the field and racing around a circuit that is naturally hard to overtake made it worse for them.

Kamui Kobayashi made full use of the situation and settled in third place, but he did not make a pit stop. He maintained the position and managed to fend off Jenson Button but the Sauber driver had to pit eventually and dropped to seventh, still a good position nevertheless. Eventual winner Vettel raced without a hitch except when he was suffering some brake issues towards the end of the race, which is why Hamilton was able to close the gap.

The Safety Car situation also led to the decision by the Stewards to investigate Button, Barrichello, Kubica, Sutil, Buemi, de la Rosa, Petrov, Liuzzi and Hulkenberg after the race. They may be penalized for driving too quickly under the Safety Car condition. While we wait the Stewards to make their decisions, you can go here view the preliminary results. Formula 1 now heads to Silverstone for the 2010 British Grand Prix.

Red Bull is now answering back to McLaren’s recent dominance with a front row lock down for tomorrow’s European Grand Prix in Valencia. The Red Bull front row is headed by Sebastian Vettel who scored his first pole position since this year’s Malaysian Grand Prix. Mark Webber is second ahead of McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton who made a mistake on his final run, which may have cost him second or possibly pole position.

Ferrari has improved following updates implemented on its cars as Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa managed fourth and fifth places respectively. Robert Kubica gave another strong performance for Renault with his sixth place ahead of Jenson Button in the other McLaren. Like his team mate Button also made a mistake on his last stint. The two Williams managed to get into the top ten and will start the race around a beautiful sea side setting in ninth and tenth positions.

Force India which is a familiar face in the top ten during qualifying only managed 13th and 14th places while Mercedes GP did not really shine either. Nico Rosberg had to settle with 12th while his 7-times World Champion team mate Michael Schumacher who made his debut in Valencia only managed 15th, his worst qualifying result thus far in the season. However it also has to be noted that Schuey was suffering from what believed to be a power steering problem.

Lotus will start the race from 19th and 20th positions with Jarno Trulli leading the way. He posted a lap time of 1.40.658 compared to 1.37.587 set by Vettel in Q3. This is a gap of about three seconds which is an improvement compared to the beginning of the season when the new teams were about five seconds off the pace. Furthermore Vettel set that lap time in Q3 meaning its after more rubber has been laid on the track. During Q1 which is when Trulli set his time, the fastest time was low 1 minute 38 seconds.

This is an important improvement especially since the FIA has decided to re-introduce the 107% qualifying rule starting from next year. The rule was last scene in 2002 and if I remember correctly Alex Yoong failed to make the cut a couple of times when he was racing for Minardi. The final four positions were taken up by Virgin and Hispania drivers. Expect a good tussle between the Red Bulls, McLarens and Ferraris during the 57-lap race around the 5.4 kilometers circuit. To view the results in full please click here.