Sebastian Vettel celebrates his second victory of the season after winning the Malaysian Grand Prix on Sunday. (Clive Mason/Getty Images)

(PhatzRadio/ CBC Sports) -Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel extended his perfect start to the Formula One season by winning the Malaysian Grand Prix on Sunday, making it back to back victories to begin the defence of his world title.

The pole sitter led throughout to win by 3.2 seconds from McLaren’s Jenson Button, with Renault’s Nick Heidfeld hanging on for third.

“I love what I do and I don’t think I could be happier at this stage,” Vettel said. “Two wins out of two is perfect, couldn’t be better, but there is still a very long way to go this season.”

Vettel’s Red Bull teammate Mark Webber recovered from a poor start, using a four-stop strategy around the Sepang International circuit to claim fourth place, with Ferrari’s Felipe Massa fifth.

Old rivals Fernando Alonso of Ferrari and and McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton had a collision in the closing laps, for which both drivers were given 20-second penalties by stewards. Alonso retained sixth place, but Hamilton was dropped from seventh to eighth.

Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi inherited seventh place after Hamilton’s penalty, while Mercedes’ Michael Schumacher made a very late passing manoeuvr to take ninth from Force India’s Paul Di Resta, who took the last point in 10th.

Vettel’s 12th career victory was made more impressive by the malfunctioning of the KERS device on the Red Bull, with the German told midway through the race that he could no longer use the power-boost, even though it became operable again later.

“It was a little bit on-off during the race, so its something we have to work on,” Vettel said, although he praised KERS for enabling him to get to the first corner in the lead, saying “it saved our life today.”

Webber also had problems with KERS, dropping from third to ninth after just one lap. By contrast, both Renaults made storming starts, with Heidfeld moving from sixth to second by the second corner and Vitaly Petrov vaulting from eighth to fifth.

With rain surprisingly holding off throughout, the closing stages developed into a fight to see who could make their tires last longest. Button used his trademark tire management to claim second.

“It was a confusing race in a way, trying to understand the pitstops,” Button said. “The last stint, when we put the hard tire on, the car came alive.”

Heidfeld came under intense pressure in the final laps but managed to hold off Webber, delivering Renault its second straight podium finish, saying “I am grateful to finish third.”

The German, who was drafted into the team at short notice to replace the injured Robert Kubica this season, now has 13 career podium finishes but is still yet to win a race.

His teammate Petrov, who was third in Australia, had a spectacular end to his race, running wide over the grass and hitting a drainage ditch which launched him through the air, across the track, and into a brake distance marker.

One of the major talking points of the race was a collision between old rivals Hamilton and Alonso with 10 laps to go. The Ferrari driver tried a switchback passing move on Hamilton but did not measure the distance correctly, and snapped off the left endplate of his front wing by nudging Hamilton’s right rear tire.

Alonso had to pit for a new front wing, while Hamilton struggled thereafter as his tires degraded, and was passed by Heidfeld then Webber before admitting defeat and pitting for new rubber with only three laps left.

After the race, stewards added an extra 20 seconds to Alonso’s time for causing the collision and the same to Hamilton for improperly defending a position. While Alonso kept his sixth place, it cost Hamilton one place and two championship points.

Alonso said the crash and subsequent pitstop “cost me maybe the podium” but was overall enthused by the Ferrari’s race pace, even if the Prancing Horse remained a long way off Red Bull and McLaren in qualifying.

“Today we were fighting with the McLarens, with Webber as well so that was a surprise for us … it was a good surprise today,” Alonso said.

Hamilton was running in second place for much of the first half of the race, trailing Vettel by only 3.9 seconds at the midway point of the race, but was left to rue the decision to try a three-stop strategy, finally forced into an unplanned fourth.

Describing the race as a “disaster”, Hamilton was asked if the team’s strategy was wrong, he said: “I think so. Maybe it’s a combination of the tires and position but it wasn’t good, that’s for sure.”

There is only a one-week gap to the third race of the season, in Shanghai, where McLaren will be hoping to make another step toward matching the Red Bulls.

“It was much tighter here than in Australia,” Vettel said. “After Australia people were talking about ‘brutal dominance’, and I tried not to read anything, and we come here and everything was different.”

Button said “we only have a few days to the next race but we are doing everything to make the small improvements we can.

“We can’t let the Red Bulls have it their own way for much longer — we want to challenge these guys.”