Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel cruised to victory
BBC
Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel cruised to victory in the Singapore GP after Lewis Hamilton's McLaren retired.
Hamilton headed Vettel from the start but a gearbox failure dealt a major blow to the Briton's world title hopes.
Fellow British driver Jenson Button took second in his McLaren from Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, who leads Vettel by 29 points in the standings, reports the BBC.
Hamilton slips to fourth, 52 points off the lead with only 150 available, seven points behind Lotus's Kimi Raikkonen.
The retirement means Hamilton will almost certainly not be able to catch Alonso in the remaining six races, barring some bad luck for the Spaniard, and it remains to be seen whether the latest in a series of disappointments this season has an effect on his future career choice.
Hamilton is out of contract at the end of the season and has two offers on the table - one to stay with McLaren and one to move to Mercedes.
Vettel's pace following Hamilton's exit suggested the McLaren might have been holding up the Red Bull slightly but Hamilton was in control of the race until his car lost drive on lap 23 coming out of the first chicane.
He had known for about a minute that there was an impending problem.
"It's one of the toughest races all year," said Vettel. "It's very long, we did the full two hours, the circuit is a killer, there are many bumps and there is no room for error.
"Obviously I benefited from Lewis's failure, which I could see for a couple of laps. I'm very happy, it's such a tough race and very proud to win it.
"I'd like to dedicate it to Sid Watkins. He will be remembered [as] one of the main reasons we can go out on a circuit like this and be reasonably safe.
"It's an incredible weekend for all of us. We have a lot of races left, we just have to use the momentum and keep pushing."
That left Vettel in front from Button, Williams's Pastor Maldonado and Alonso but they raced only until lap 33, when a crash by Narain Karthikeyan's HRT brought out the safety car.
Maldonado dropped down the order after pitting to change tyres, even though he had made his second pit stop only four laps earlier at the same time as Alonso.
The Venezuelan, who had qualified second, retired before the race was restarted with a hydraulics problem.