The drama stepped up a notch even after the chequered flag in Barcelona.

A couple of hours after Williams’ first win since 2004, something exploded in the British team’s garage, triggering a major fire.

Team members and fire crews battled the blaze as paddock regulars scrambled away from the heavy smoke and police arrived on the scene.

The Telegraph’s Tom Cary said on Twitter there are “multiple injuries”.

It is believed Williams, Force India and Caterham staff – some of whom bravely fought the fire – are being treated in the medical centre, some for smoke inhalation.

An emergency helicopter will ferry others to hospital.

“Couple of our guys got injuries, burns and maybe one broken wrist, no news on Williams guys I hope they’re ok,” wrote Caterham’s Heikki Kovalainen on Twitter.

Rumours indicated the fire could have been caused by a KERS explosion, or possibly fuel, as a burned fuel rig was pulled from the gutted garage.

 Hot on the heels of the new technical controversies, the 2012 season has also kicked off in the sport’s high-intrigue world of politics.
A fascinating blog post by Sky News’ City editor Mark Kleinman has been pulled from the internet just hours after it went live.

It was about “F1 finance and control allegedly involving Ferrari, Red Bull and (the sport’s owner) CVC”, according to veteran journalist and broadcaster Maurice Hamilton on Twitter.

“Has someone spoken out of turn?” wondered the Times’ Kevin Eason.

The Telegraph’s Tom Cary said the rumour is that a $10 billion stock market floatation for F1 could be in the works “with Ferrari (and) Red Bull getting special deals”.

“There is no smoke without fire with this one,” added Eason. “No wonder Ferrari and Red Bull ditched FOTA.”

The document that currently governs F1 and its finances, the Concorde Agreement, runs out this year, and now F1′s most famous team – Ferrari – and the reigning world champions are outside the trade union FOTA.

“Coincidence? Highly unlikely,” said Cary.

F1 chief executive Bernie Ecclestone insists no deals have been done yet.

“I’d like to try to do something before the season starts,” he said this week. “I don’t want it dragging on.”

As for his take on FOTA, “Ferrari would never go do a deal with those clowns,” the 81-year-old scowled.

Sebastian Vettel needs to accept the reality of a number 2 role for the good of Red Bull’s 2010 title chances.

That is the claim of former triple world champion and outspoken commentator Niki Lauda, following reports the young German is reluctant to give up the chase for his first title in deference to the team’s points leader Mark Webber.

The news also follows boss Christian Horner’s insistence that the team will “support both (drivers) equally” in Brazil and Abu Dhabi “in line with Red Bull’s credible sporting ethos”.

But with Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso leading the championship and fully backed by his teammate Felipe Massa, Lauda said Red Bull’s policy is a road to failure.

“Red Bull needs to establish the team hierarchy now,” the great Austrian is quoted by Bild newspaper.

“If they don’t get behind Mark Webber, they may have to go without the title.”

Lauda’s only concern is that the exercising of team orders within Red Bull is done in a way that does not “cheat the spectators”.

Jos Verstappen, who in the mid-90s at Benetton was Michael Schumacher’s number 2, agrees that Vettel should be playing that role now.

“Purely mathematically, he has a chance to be champion. But as a team they really have to put everything behind Webber.

“He (Webber) has a better chance of winning the title,” the Dutchman wrote in his column for De Telegraaf newspaper.

“Of course it’s a difficult position for Red Bull, as the whole world knows who they would prefer to be in the best position.

“It’s unfortunate for Vettel, but with his engine failure in Korea his championship did literally go up in smoke,” added Verstappen.

But Horner sounds unlikely to have a change of heart, telling the BBC he finds it “frustrating” that 7 points of leader Alonso’s 11 point lead was due to inheriting the German grand prix win from his teammate Massa.

“It (losing the title to Alonso) would be frustrating because we’ve obviously worked under the auspices that team orders have been illegal,” he told BBC radio.

Bernie Ecclestone and Jean Todt met in Korea last weekend and, according to a German report, “smoked the peace pipe”.

There had been speculation that F1 chief executive Ecclestone was supporting a possible power coup organised by Todt’s predecessor as FIA president, Max Mosley.

But Frenchman Todt and Ecclestone had a “long conversation” at the Yeongam circuit, Auto Motor und Sport reports.

“We want to work well together into the future,” Ecclestone, who turns 80 on Thursday, is quoted as saying afterwards.

Todt, meanwhile, said the rumours about the coup had been exaggerated.

“This season has shown that I am interfering as little as possible,” he said. “And If Mosley offers me his advice, this will also be welcome.”

Fernando Alonso I need the engines to the end of the season divided exactly – At Ferrari about a fix already smoked their heads.

In the battle for the championship crown Fernando Alonso wants in the three races to play a major role. But quite apart from the question of whether his Ferrari is competitive enough for it, also plays into it with the motor bottleneck. With the block in Korea as the motor would drive Ferrari in Abu Dhabi. In this case, the season for Alonso would be feasible without penalty.

But if there were an engine problem and a ninth engine must be used, it would be a disciplinary transfer of ten ranks given in the starting lineup – in the championship fight a hard punishment. “If we have reliability problems, it would be traumatic, because then it would be almost impossible to make up the necessary points. Red Bull and McLaren are just extremely strong. We can not afford any mistakes, otherwise it’s over,” said team boss Stefano Domenicali.
Nevertheless, the task is difficult. “It will be extremely difficult to wade to the end,” he said. “We will try to divide the mileage of the current engine. This is the plan and hopefully we make it to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.” Alonso himself has full confidence in his team, however.

“Of course we got our engine problems in the second and third race in a difficult situation, no question, but from then on we have planned the season just different,” said the Spaniard. “Until now we have the situation under control. I’m doing for the last three races, no worries. Everything is okay.”
But Ferrari have to stretch to match the optimism of the star drivers. “The question is how much mileage we get on an engine,” said Domenicali. “We have extended the mileage and tested it at home so it’s no problem. But we must be careful that something is not overheated. At the temperatures we may not be aggressive. We have to watch really in the climatically hot race to South Korea. ”
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Heikki Kovalainen made the Grand Prix of Singapore at the end once more exciting and put out his blazing Lotus itself
The air seemed to be already out of the Grand Prix of Singapore, as Heikki Kovalainen in the penultimate round again caused a drama. Because after a light touch with the Toro Rosso of Sebastien Buemi, he was suddenly slow – and in the last sector ignited the back of his Lotus!

Kovalainen not turned off the box, but drove over the finish line. However, he was not here for an additional round for the final result was as suspected at first: “I wanted to with such a car will not go into the pit lane, because that would put many people Instead, I saw a fireman at the start and finish and stayed. there are, “he describes the exciting incident.
Curious: Kovalainen rose calmly from the car that was burning brightly in the rear, and still had the overview, to make themselves rich on the pit wall by a Williams mechanic with a fire extinguisher so that it could even lend a hand! “Something always looks dramatic,” he grins. “The car is a bit damaged, but at least no one was injured. That’s the main thing.”
Given that reasoning, it is unlikely that the race stewards will issue a penalty against him. Usually, it is well known, not allowed to drive on with an obviously badly damaged car – especially not when the pit exit would be located on the road. But Kovalainen reasoning makes sense, because it was so actually less risky.

By the way: through the smoke on the finish line and the yellow flags came Sebastian Vettel in the last round again threatening close to leader Fernando Alonso. Alonso, however, kept a cool head and saved his second victory in Singapore over the distance.