Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel cruised to victory in Singapore as he closed the gap on Fernando Alonso to just 29 points.

It was yet another frustrating race for Lewis Hamilton as he was forced to retire following a gearbox failure to further dent the Briton’s title hopes. Hamilton’s retirement from the race sees him slip to fourth in the championship, 52 points off the lead, and with just six races remaining his chances of catching Alonso are almost impossible.

“I won’t give up,” said Hamilton. I’ll keep pushing to the end. Of course, it makes it a bit harder. He went on say, “It was gutting when the car stopped; I was cruising. I was managing the gap and could have pushed more, I had the pace. I think today could have been an easy win.”

It wasn’t all doom and gloom for McLaren as Jensen Button took second, further cementing his position in sixth place in the championship, but another retirement for the team will certainly re-spark speculation surrounding Hamilton’s future, as the team have been plagued with unreliable performances this season.

Michael Schumacher failed to finish his second successive race at Singapore after running into the back of another car – and it was the second time this season resulting in a 10-place grid penalty for the Japanese Grand Prix.

The race had been heavily built up, but unfortunately the standard of racing didn’t match this hype, nonetheless it was a vital victory for Vettel as he took the lead from Hamilton 23 laps from the end, with Alonso finishing third and Briton Di Resta snapping up fourth.

1. Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull 2:00:26.144 = 25pts
2. Jenson Button - McLaren+00:08.959 = 18pts
3. Fernando Alonso - Ferrari +00:15.227 = 15pts
4. Paul Di Resta - Force Indi+00:19.063 = 12pts
5. Nico Rosberg - Mercedes +00:34.784 =10pts
6. Kimi Raikkonen - Lotus+00:35.759 = 8pts
7. Romain Grosjean - Lotus+00:36.698 = 6pts
8. Felipe Massa - Ferrari +00:42.829 = 4pts
9. Daniel Ricciardo - Toro Rosso+00:45.820 = 2pts
10. Sergio Perez - Sauber +00:50.619 = 1pts