Jenson Button finished second in a McLaren, and Nick Heidfeld completed the podium for Renault, in third place.

In the second Red Bull Racing car, Sebastian Vettel finished seventeenth overall, four seconds off Webber's pace; however, with comments from team principal Christian Horner in the build-up to the event suggesting that the unraced KERS device would be essential, Vettel's program was focused on developing the KERS unit rather than outright pace.

[8] The session was scattered with incidents; Virgin driver Jérôme d'Ambrosio suffered a mechanical fault that caused his right-front suspension to fail.

Further down the pit lane, Renault experienced two similar problems, first with Nick Heidfeld, whose front-right tyre locked in place, and he was able to limp back to the garage.

Vitaly Petrov was sidelined with a mechanical failure for most of the first session, and spun off at turn 9 when he experienced a similar problem to Heidfeld.

Both Renaults spent most of the second session in the pits while the team investigated the problems, which was discovered to have come from a material fault in the suspension uprights, but they were limited to just a handful of laps overall.

Pastor Maldonado set the fastest time early in the session, but damaged his Williams when he spun into a wall in the pit lane entry and slipped down the order.

The Hispania's new front wing worked as expected, with Liuzzi able to set times within 107% of the leader's benchmark in both practice sessions.

Buemi's car was inspected by the FIA and cleared to return to the circuit, though the exact cause of the problem remained unknown.

Both Hispanias were also eliminated, but comfortably made the grid as Narain Karthikeyan in twenty-fourth position was a second inside the 107% margin.

A late lap from Kamui Kobayashi saw him qualify for the final session at the expense of Michael Schumacher, who was demoted to eleventh place for the second race in a row.

In what would be a dominant race for the 2010 World Champion, Vettel made a clean break from the lights and quickly began developing a strong lead from the rest of the pack.

The debris damaged the front wing and floor of the Sauber before passing through both the chassis and the protective Zylon panel, and hitting the ECU.

[14] Karthikeyan experienced an abnormal spike in water temperature on lap 15, whilst Liuzzi's car was subject to vibrations from the rear wing.

Behind Vettel, the McLarens of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button fought with Fernando Alonso for position, Button coming out on top and ultimately taking his first podium of the season, ahead of Nick Heidfeld who finished third, whilst both Hamilton and Alonso were penalised for their actions on track.