FURIOUS Mark Webber overcame Red Bull Racing's controversial decision to give his team mate Sebastian Vettel a new front wing by winning the British Grand Prix at Silverstone.
Webber finished ahead of championship leader Lewis Hamilton with Nico Rosberg in third and Jenson Button in fourth despite Red Bull's decision to favour Vettel.
Vettel damaged his new front wing in final practice but he inherited the one from Webber's car before narrowly out-qualifying his Australian team mate in another Red Bull front-row.
But Webber, using an old front wing, beat Vettel to the first corner and gave no quarter as Vettel ran out of track.
Vettel then received a puncture to his right rear tyre after contact with Hamilton and this effectively ended any chance of the German making it back-to-back victories at Silverstone.
Having emerged from the opening lap in the lead, Webber was able to use Red Bull's superior pace to pull away from Hamilton for a comfortable - and highly satisfying - win.
As he took the chequered flag, Webber made his feelings clear over the team radio. His words - "not bad for a number two driver" - were dripping with injustice of it all as the Red Bull 'civil war' became public.
Webber later referred to his victory as "an appointment with karma" and he now moves above Vettel into third place in the Drivers' Championship behind McLaren pair Hamilton and Button.
Hopes for a British victory at Silverstone faded away in Saturday's qualifying session as McLaren's new exhaust unbalanced the car and left Hamilton in fourth and Button in 14th.
But both Britons made excellent starts to finish the race in second and fourth. Hamilton got past Fernando Alonso before the first corner then accidentally inflicted Vettel with a puncture.
Meanwhile, Button was up six places to eighth by the end of the opening lap and his fourth place keep him just behind Hamilton in the overall standings.
The season passed the halfway mark at Silverstone and 2008 champion Hamilton leads the way with 145 points with Button on 133, Webber on 128 and Vettel on 121.
Two-time champion Alonso is fifth but now lags somewhat behind on 98 points after Ferrari suffered another miserable race day.
Alonso had qualified in third to increase the chances of a first Ferrari win at Silverstone since Kimi Raikkonen in 2007.
However, the Spaniard collided inadvertently with team mate Felipe Massa and, by the time the race settled down, not only was Hamilton ahead of him but also Mercedes' Nico Rosberg and Renault's Robert Kubica.
The clash caused Massa to receive a puncture which ended his interest of a competitive finish and left the Brazilian without a points finish for a third race in a row.
Alonso then fell foul of the race stewards having overtaken Kubica illegally on lap 19.
But his punishment - a drive-through penalty - was especially harsh as it was given after Kubica had retired and, worse, just as the safety car came out.
That dropped Alonso towards the back of the field and left him with an almighty task even just to score some minor points.
After five laps of struggling behind Force India's Vitantonio Liuizzi, Alonso finally made his move to pass the Italian but his haste cost him a puncture and he finished 14th.
By the time the safety car came out, Vettel had made his way through the field and was 12th. At the resumption, the German easily picked off Jaime Alguersuari, Vitaly Petrov and fellow German Nico Hulkenberg to move into ninth.
Then came more difficult resistance from his other fellow countrymen Michael Schumacher and Adrian Sutil but they were powerless to stop Vettel making the best of a bad day to finish seventh.
But far too often this season have the Red Bull drivers had to scrap around for points when they clearly have the fastest car on the circuit and simmering tensions between team mates have hardly helped.
Of course, the rivalry between Webber and Vettel was brought to a head earlier in the season at the Turkish Grand Prix at the end of May.
Webber qualified on pole and was on for a hat-trick of wins after successes in Spain and Monaco and, during the race in Turkey, he led Vettel in what looked like being a magnificent third 1-2 for Red Bull.
However, half way through the race, Vettel's pace picked up and he closed right up to Webber before attempting an overtaking manoeuvre on lap 39.
Webber adopted a defensive line but Vettel continued to pursue space that just was not there.
Needless to say, it went horribly wrong for the pair and their collision dropped Webber to third and put Vettel out of the race altogether.
As if it could not get any worse for Red Bull, the two cars to benefit from the incident were those of Hamilton and Button who managed to complete their own 1-2 instead.
Hamilton then replaced Webber as the form driver, becoming the first non-Red Bull of the season on pole in Canada.
On race day, Hamilton won again and McLaren completed their second successive 1-2 but only after an eventful afternoon in Montreal in which Hamilton overhauled Webber courtesy of a superior tyre strategy.
Two weeks later at the European Grand Prix in Valencia, Vettel revived Red Bull's dominance as he recorded his first pole position in five races.
Vettel won the race easily but Webber failed to finish after a dramatic crash into the back of Heikki Kovalainen on lap eight.
The collision, at 190 mph, caused Webber's Red Bull to flip upside down in mid-air before bouncing down into the side-barriers.
It is truly a testament of the design of modern Formula 1 cars that the Aussie survived with nothing more than a few minor injuries.
But his retirement and Vettel's victory in Valencia clearly influenced Red Bull strategy at Silverstone with clear favouritism towards the German.
Now Webber has hit back and this four-horse race for the title looks set to stay close during the second half of a fascinating season.
Red Bull still have the faster car but there remain doubts whether their drivers can stop bickering for long enough to overhaul the lead of the McLarens.
EARLIER F1 2010 REPORTS
19 Apr 2010 Button takes an early lead (after Chinese GP)
13 Mar 2010 Team-by-team preview
2010 Season Results
PODIUMS
Bahrain GP (Pole: Sebastian Vettel)
1 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari
2 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari
3 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
Australian GP (Pole: Sebastian Vettel)
1 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
2 Robert Kubica (Pol) Renault
3 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari
Malaysian GP (Pole: Mark Webber)
1 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault
2 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault
3 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes
Chinese GP (Pole: Sebastian Vettel)
1 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
2 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
3 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes
Spanish GP (Pole: Mark Webber)
1 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault
2 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari
3 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault
Monaco GP (Pole: Mark Webber)
1 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault
2 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault
3 Robert Kubica (Pol) Renault
Turkish GP (Pole: Mark Webber)
1 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
2 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
3 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault
Canadian GP (Pole: Lewis Hamilton)
1 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
2 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
3 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari
European GP (Valencia) (Pole: Sebastian Vettel)
1 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault
2 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
3 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
British GP (Pole: Sebastian Vettel)
1 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault
2 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes
3 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes
Remaining races: German GP (25 July), Hungarian GP (1 August), Belgian GP (29 August), Italian GP (12 September), Singapore GP (26 September), Japanese GP (10 October), Korean GP (24 October), Brazilian GP (7 November), Abu Dhabi GP (14 November)
STANDINGS
Drivers' Championship
1 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes 145 (2 wins)
2 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes 133 (2 wins)
3 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault 128 (3 wins)
4 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault 121 (2 wins)
5 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari 98 (1 win)
6 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes 90
7 Robert Kubica (Pol) Renault 83
8 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari 67
9 Michael Schumacher (Ger) Mercedes 36
10 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India-Mercedes 35
11 Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Williams-Cosworth 29
12 Kamui Kobayashi (Jpn) BMW Sauber-Ferrari 15
13 Vitantonio Liuzzi (Ita) Force India-Mercedes 12
14 Sebastien Buemi (Swi) Toro Rosso-Ferrari 7
15 Vitaly Petrov (Rus) Renault 6
16 Jaime Alguersuari (Spa) Toro Rossi-Ferrari 3
17 Nico Hulkenberg (Ger) Williams-Cosworth 2
Eight drivers have yet to score
Constructors' Championship
1 McLaren-Mercedes 278
2 Red Bull-Renault 249
3 Ferrari 165
4 Mercedes 126
5 Renault 89
6 Force India-Mercedes 47
7 Williams-Cosworth 31
8 BMW Sauber-Ferrari 15
9 Toro Rosso-Ferrari 10
Three teams have yet to score
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