2013 Formula One Mario Kart season

The 2013 Formula One Mario Kart season was held on 32 tracks in the Mario Kart DS universe.

Constructors and drivers

 * *April's Racers applied for a place in the championship, but is currently pending verification.

Figure-8 Circuit
Defending champion Sebastian Vettel took pole for the first race of the season. However, on race day, things didn't look too promising for the German as his Red Bull stalled on the grid. This enabled his rival Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes to take the lead. Vettel was forced to start from the pit lane.

On lap 15, Charles Pic was involved in a collision with fellow Frenchman Romain Grosjean as Grosjean was about to lap him. Pic's Caterham was catapulted 10 feet into the air before it smashed into the tyre wall. Pic was lucky to survive but he would be out for the next 3 races, therefore ending his Mushroom Cup season there. Grosjean was disqualified from the race for causing the accident and had to serve a one-race ban. Their replacements were April A. Anderson and Jerome d'Ambrosio, respectively.

Hamilton duly took the win ahead of team-mate Nico Rosberg as third went to Mark Webber in the other Red Bull. Vettel would finish down in 12th, starting his season on a low. Hamilton also took the fastest lap of the race; 1:37.249.

Yoshi Falls
Lotus was having a bad start to their year after their other driver, Kimi Raikkonen. who finished fourth in the last race, ate too much Magic Mushrooms and went on a rampage, attacking all the Yoshis in the land and forcing Lotus to change their line-up completely. The #7 car was to be taken by Italian driver Davide Valsecchi, last year's GP2 champion.

Jerome d'Ambrosio, making a one-race appearance for Lotus, took a surprise pole position, beating Sebastian Vettel by half a second. Vettel was so annoyed at the Belgian's performance that he refused to start the race the next day.

d'Ambrosio led from his first-ever pole position, with Vettel failing to start for the second race running. Lewis Hamilton, the winner of the first race, ended up stuck behind April Anderson (making her debut, and being the first woman from the UK to successfully start a Grand Prix) and lost second place, infuriating the 2008 World Champion so much that he flipped her off. Hamilton, as a result, was slapped with a 20-second time penalty. This pushed him to the limit and he parked his car up, refusing to take any further part in the race.

d'Ambrosio and Ferrari's Fernando Alonso battled for the lead all race long. However, the star of the show was Anderson who took tenth from Toro Rosso's Jean-Eric Vergne, putting a Caterham into the points for the first time.

The race was won by d'Ambrosio, who scored the first victory for Belgium since 1990 when Thierry Boutsen won the Hungarian Grand Prix. Alonso took second while third went to Mercedes' Nico Rosberg who scored his second podium in a row. Red Bull's day went from bad to worse as neither Vettel nor Mark Webber scored points for the Milton Keynes-based team, with Webber retiring on lap 22 with an engine failure.

Caterham team boss Cyril Abiteboul gave Anderson a £1,000 prize after scoring the Malaysian team's first-ever point, only to be interrupted by a furious Hamilton, who crushed Anderson's hand as she apologised to him. This sparked a fight between Hamilton and Anderson's team-mate Giedo van der Garde, which resulted in injuries to three spectators. Hamilton and van der Garde were each given two-race bans.

Three drivers, Max Chilton of Marussia, Esteban Gutierrez of Sauber and Felipe Massa of Ferrari, retired after crashing their cars into the lake. The fastest lap (0:56.942) was set by d'Ambrosio completing a hat-trick for the Belgian driver.

Cheep Cheep Beach
Romain Grosjean was back in the #8 Lotus after his suspension in which his replacement Jerome d'Ambrosio won, much to Grosjean's chagrin. Grosjean's team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was also well enough to return to the cockpit. Pole went to Sebastian Vettel, his second of the year. Lewis Hamilton and Giedo van der Garde were suspended for two races for their bust-up in the last race, their respective replacements being Anthony Davidson and Alexander Rossi.

Vettel got a better start this time, leading into the first turn. No accidents on lap one. Just then, debutant Rossi's Caterham broke down on the grid, ending his first race before it even started.

Fernando Alonso of Ferrari took the lead from Vettel and led to the point where Vettel lost his temper and smashed him off the track, regaining the lead. Vettel was handed a 2-minute time penalty, making him even more annoyed, and he deliberately stopped in the middle of the track, endangering other drivers.

Alonso recovered, however losing 4 positions and handing the lead to Grosjean in the Lotus and putting the Frenchman on track for his first-ever win. And it was to be. Grosjean got what he wanted, scoring Lotus' second win in a row as second went to Felipe Massa in the other Ferrari and third to Jenson Button, who scored McLaren's first podium of the year. Fastest lap went to Button.

Build-up to the final race
A lot has happened between the last two rounds of the Mushroom Cup season.
 * Kimi Raikkonen gulps another dose of Magic Mushrooms and is sent to the Helsinki Funny Farm, where he has four wild fantasies. They are;
 * Raikkonen's car flying into purgatory.
 * All of Raikkonen's team-mates through the years playing Whack-a-Kimi. Felipe Massa does exactly what it says on the tin.
 * Raikkonen turning into a dog.
 * Lewis Hamilton running off with Raikkonen's 2007 trophy as the TV commentators (including Murray Walker, Martin Brundle, James Hunt, James Allen and so on) play Operation with a hypnotised Wendy Corduroy as the patient. Walker plucks out Wendy's tooth, using the pun "Nothing but the tooth".
 * Charles Pic, who is in a wheelchair, helps Romain Grosjean, who caused his crash in the first race, wash his car, rekindling their friendship.
 * Hamilton and Giedo van der Garde are still fighting, blaming each other for their bust-up at Yoshi Falls.
 * Alexander Rossi does practice laps at Circuit of the Americas as an American hypnotist promotes his products while waving the American flag in support of Rossi.

Luigi's Mansion
The race that decided who won the Mushroom Cup saw Sebastian Vettel on pole again. Despite having scored no points at all, the German was determined to get his way for once. But it was not to be, for his Red Bull fell apart at the very start, all thanks to his rival Fernando Alonso.

Alonso's Ferrari led until lap 37, when his car fell apart as well, forcing him to retire and denying him a 100% points record. Rosberg zoomed through and led the remainder of the race to win it, along with the Mushroom Cup and his first major motorsport title! Second went to Felipe Massa in the other Ferrari (the second time in a row) while Kimi Raikkonen completed the podium in third. Rosberg was also the fastest lap setter.

Vettel, upset at having scored no points towards the Mushroom Cup, decided to quit Red Bull until he calmed down and was ready to drive again. This allowed Portugal's Antonio Felix da Costa, the Red Bull test driver, to make his Formula One debut.

Other retirees during the race included Jules Bianchi, whose Marussia caught fire, Anthony Davidson, who crashed out, and Mark Webber and Adrian Sutil, who collided with each other, in another bad race weekend for Red Bull.

Young Drivers' Test
A young drivers' test was held between the Mushroom Cup and Flower Cup seasons at the GCN Baby Park Circuit. Kevin Magnussen of McLaren set the fastest time in 0:52.295.