Lewis Hamilton only needed to finish fifth to guarantee himself the title, but started the final lap in sixth spot - and with little apparent chance of overtaking Sebastian Vettel just ahead of him.
However, a downpour hindered the progress of Toyota's Timo Glock on the final lap, as the German was running on dry tyres, and allowed Hamilton to snatch the position he needed just two corners from home.
Although the team were confident that Hamilton would be able to catch Glock on that final lap, Whitmarsh has admitted there was a brief period of time when he thought it was too late.
"Well, you worry – and you never doubt the quality of Lewis," he said. "But certainly, despite all the predictions and the analysis, I wondered whether the prediction that we would catch Glock would come about.
"We were saying: 'Vettel is in front, don't take risks but Glock is on dry tyres and you should catch him this lap'. But then you start to think, is this really going to happen?"
He added: "We were looking at a GPS prediction, and we believed we could catch Glock, but I looked up at the screen as we crossed the line and I could not see him. Then I looked back at the screen.
"We knew he was on the wrong tyre for the conditions. We knew he was losing temperature, and we expected him to come back quickly to us. It is all science, all maths, all prediction, and you like to believe it. But then you start to wonder – have you got it right or has this gone horribly wrong for us?
"Fortunately it came well and Lewis kept his head. He drove a terrific race for a piece of history made today.
"To say it was textbook makes it sound pretty unemotional, because it was pretty damn tense through the whole team I can tell you."
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