150th pole for McLaren

Lewis Hamilton secured McLaren´s 150 pole, when he set a late time of 1:20.953, improving on his own best time, which already had given him pole.

But it wasn´t a walk in the park. As the clock ticked, Hamilton´s early fastest time, seemed to be well out of the reach of even the usual extremely fast drivers, and a calm and collected Hamilton was seen sitting in the garage, waiting to see what would happen in the dying seconds. And sure enough, we saw another close qualifying session, right to the end, in which Sebastian looked to be stealing pole from the Stevenage Speedster.

Vettel was fast in Sector 1, then lost very little time in Sector 2, but eventually finished P2. But out of the blue came Romain Grosjean, an expert qualifier I must say, to snatch P2 from Vettel and Grosjean must be having a great time in that Lotus these days.

Fourth placed finisher is Jenson Button, so perhaps a strong weekend for the McLaren boys, as Hungaroring is very difficult to overtake on. Starting positions is everything. Kimi Raikkonen is starting P5 ahead of Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa, then double positives for Williams, as Pastor Maldonado and Bruno Senna both made into the top tenth, while Nico Hulkenberg starts tenth.

Mark Webber is disappointed to be starting P11, ahead of Paul di Resta and Nico Rosberg, who looked to be suffering during the session. Sergio Perez and Kamui Kobayashi represents Sauber in P14 and P15, while Jean-Eric Vergne starts ahead of Michael Schumacher in P17.

Final finishers are Daniel Ricciardo P18, from Heikki Kovalainen, Vitaly Petrov, Charles Pic, Timo Glock, Pedro de la Rosa and Narain Karthikeyan.

Revised grid for Hockenheim

Romain Grosjean carried a five-place penalty from Silverstone, and also Nico Rosberg and Mark Webber were given penalties, for gear box changes.

The revised grid therefor looks like this:

Fernando Alonso

Sebastian Vettel

Michael Schumacher

Nico Hulkenberg

Pastor Maldonado

Jenson Button

Lewis Hamilton

Mark Webber

Paul Di Resta

Kimi Raikkonen

Daniel Ricciardo

Kamui Kobayashi

Felipe Massa

Bruno Senna

Jean-Eric Vergne

Heikki Kovalainen

Sergio Perez

Vitaly Petrov

Romain Grosjean

Charles Pic

Nico Rosberg

Timo Glock

Pedro de la Rosa

Narain Karthikeyan

Alonso grabs pole again

Fernando Alonso drew the longest straw in the qualifying session for the German GP in Hockenheim on Saturday, as a rain-soaked circuit did the best to play havoc with the drivers.

While Q1 was done in dry conditions, rain was expected halfway and didn´t disappoint. Exactly as expected, massive rain started to fall and thunder strikes were a warning of the weather to come. When Q2 started, the rain was there and the drivers started their runs on the intermediate tyres, but it soon became apparent that turned out to be insufficient, as the grip just wasn´t enough, so they quickly changed for full wets.

Q2 ended with Hamilton on top, followed by Schumacher, Vettel, Alonso, Button, Maldonado, Webber, Hulkenberg, di Resta and Raikkonen, who complained that he was held up by another driver. The trouble with the rain was that the wet tyres didn´t perform as they could be, because there wasn´t enough rain for them to work the way they should, but intermediates would be hazardous. That small gap in performance is what we have seen from the dry tyres in the season, making this one of the most exciting and close seasons in recent history. Ricciardo finished 11th, Perez 12th, Kobayashi 13th,, Massa 14th, Grosjean 15th, Senna 16th and Rosberg 17th. Not the result he had hoped for.

As Q3 started Fernando Alonso was send out by Charlie Whiting to see if the conditions were ok to drive on, got the go ahead and the drivers started their final session. This included several near misses and a trip to the gravel for Hulkenberg, but the conditions quickly improved and the lap times got faster for every driver, until finally Alonso was able to take his second consecutive pole of the season.

 

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
1.	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	01:40.621	23
2.	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull	01:41.026	23
3.	Mark Webber	Red Bull	01:41.496	24
4.	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	01:42.459	24
5.	Nico Hülkenberg	Force India	01:43.501	24
6.	Pastor Maldonado	Williams	01:43.950	27
7.	Jenson Button	McLaren	01:44.113	20
8.	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren	01:44.186	18
9.	Paul di Resta	Force India	01:44.889	26
10.	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus	01:45.811	26
11.	Daniel Ricciardo	Toro Rosso	01:39.789	15
12.	Sergio Perez	Sauber	01:39.933	17
13.	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber	01:39.985	16
14.	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	01:40.212	17
15.	Bruno Senna	Williams	01:40.574	18
16.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	01:40.752	21
17.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	01:41.551	18
18.	Jean-Eric Vergne	Toro Rosso	01:16.741	9
19.	Heikki Kovalainen	Caterham	01:17.620	8
20.	Vitaly Petrov	Caterham	01:18.531	9
21.	Charles Pic	Marussia	01:19.220	12
22.	Timo Glock	Marussia	01:19.291	11
23.	Pedro de la Rosa	HRT	01:19.912	8
24.	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT	01:20.230	10

Rosberg, Webber to move five places back

Nico Rosberg and Mark Webber will have to move five places down on the grid, after Saturday´s qualifying session.

Rosberg was forced to change his gearbox after the second practice session on Friday afternoon, after he finished the session in 2nd place. Rosberg looked to be strong this weekend, at least for pole, but he will now have to add five places more to his qualifying lap times. Romain Grosjean, another potential pole sitter for Sunday´s race, is equally hampered by a five-place penalty, as he had to change his gearbox after the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, a fortnight ago.

And finally Mark Webber receives five places down on the grid, as his mechanics worked after hours, using one of the four exceptions of the curfew rule, in order to establish what the issue was. And it was a gearbox change for Webber as well.

 

Alonso grabs pole at Silverstone

After an hour and a half of stoppage due to massive rain falls, Fernando Alonso were able to take pole position, ahead of Mark Webber for Red Bull and Michael Schumacher for Mercedes.

0.050 separated Alonso from Webber on their final hot lap, but it was enough for Alonso to take his first pole position of the 2012 season. Quite an achievement after the slow start the Ferrari team had to their campaign. After two victories from the Spaniard, Alonso is the first to take two wins this season, things definitely looks better than in March.

Mark Webber will start from 2nd, Michael Schumacher starts 3rd and Sebastian Vettel starts 4th. Then we have Felipe Massa in 5th, who enjoyed a brief P1, then Kimi Raikkonen, Pastor Maldonado, Lewis Hamilton, who struggled a lot with the grip. Nico Hulkenberg and Romain Grosjean finished off the top ten.

In 11th we have Paul di Resta, Kamui Kobayashi is next, then Nico Rosberg,Daniel Ricciardo, Bruno Senna, Jean-Eric Vergne, Sergui Perez, Jenson Button Vitaly Petrov, Heikki Kovalainen, Timo Glock, Pedro de la Rosa, Narain Karthikeyan and Charles Pic.

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
1.	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	01:51.746	25
2.	Mark Webber	Red Bull	01:51.796	23
3.	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	01:52.020	22
4.	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull	01:52.199	23
5.	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	01:53.065	24
6.	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus	01:53.290	24
7.	Pastor Maldonado	Williams	01:53.539	25
8.	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren	01:53.543	25
9.	Nico Hülkenberg	Force India	01:54.382	22
10.	Romain Grosjean	Lotus	no time	20
11.	Paul di Resta	Force India	01:57.009	19
12.	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber	01:57.071	18
13.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	01:57.071	17
14.	Daniel Ricciardo	Toro Rosso	01:57.108	18
15.	Bruno Senna	Williams	01:57.132	19
16.	Jean-Eric Vergne	Toro Rosso	01:57.426	18
17.	Sergio Perez	Sauber	01:57.895	19
18.	Jenson Button	McLaren	01:48.044	12
19.	Vitaly Petrov	Caterham	01:49.027	10
20.	Heikki Kovalainen	Caterham	01:49.477	10
21.	Timo Glock	Marussia	01:51.618	10
22.	Pedro de la Rosa	HRT	01:51.742	11
23.	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT	01:53.040	10
24.	Charles Pic	Marussia	01:54.143	10

Only 23 drivers today

Marussia´s German driver Timo Glock will sit out the European Grand Prix in Valencia.

After not being able to participate in Saturday´s qualifying session, due to stomach ache, Timo Glock had further tests done to reveal an intestinal infection. The stewards granted him permission to race, as his final practice time on Saturday morning, was fast enough to put him inside the 107% rule.

Glock will not be replaced for the race by test driver Maria de Villota.

Lotus duo happy with results

Both Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean seems to be getting the best out of the car these days, coming from Canada´s great result for Grosjean as he finished on the podium for the second time this season, while Raikkonen did have to settle for 8th.

Still it´s valuable points and the performance of the cars and the drivers is just one example why the team is 3rd in the standings with 108 points. Both drivers agreed the qualifying pace was high and that meant not much had to go wrong in order to drop out of the top ten, but Raikkonen starts 5th on Sunday, with Grosjean sitting behind Lewis Hamilton in 4th place.

“It was very close in qualifying, especially in Q2, so it’s good to be fifth on the grid,” said Raikkonen.

“The car felt good. If we could have improved just a little bit on my last lap then we could have gained a couple of places, but it is an improvement on last time out so I’m very happy with that. We found a few good things with the setup this morning to make the car easier to drive. I’m looking forward to tomorrow. The car usually goes well in the race when it’s hot, so let’s see what we can do.”

“Today we got pretty much the most out of the car that we could have,” Grosjean added.

“P4 is a good position for the start of the race but of course you want always more and to do better. Sebastian did an unbelievable lap and today we could not have matched it. We have improved our qualifying performance but there is still room to do better. Tyre degradation will be more important than what we saw at the last race. There will be 57 laps in hot conditions on Sunday; we will see what we can do for a good race tomorrow.”

Alonso: It´s like a cold shower

Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa are not at all happy with their qualifying performance on Saturday afternoon, when they only managed to finish 11th and 13th respectively.

In what became a very close fight for pole, all three qualifying sessions threw up different pole leaders and no certain winner was i sight until the very last minute, when Sebastian Vettel smoked the opposition by clearing more than three tenths off the pace and qualify for his third pole in Valencia.

Speaking about their qualifying session, Alonso and Massa were clearly disappointed, especially, as both drivers feel that the progress made with  the car has been positive and it also felt better to drive.

“When you don’t qualify for Q3, it’s obviously very sad and there’s no point hiding the fact,” said Alonso.

“This result is a cold shower, because our expectations were high and the car’s potential has also increased, to the extent that in Q2, we were only three tenths off the best. It’s easy to say now that with two runs on Softs in Q2 we would have made the cut, but maybe now we would be here lamenting the fact that we did not have two for Q3: it’s always easy to judge things after the fact. However, we were not quick enough to be in the top ten in the second part of qualifying and now the race will naturally be tougher.

“The podium is out of reach and clearly, with Hamilton on the front row, it’s easy to expect that we will lose ground to him. However, the race will be very long and will be run in even higher temperatures than today’s, which means everyone will have to be very careful when it comes to tyre management. Let’s hope that, starting from the clean side of the track I can quickly make up a few places and then we will try to also make the most of the two sets of new Softs we have left: that’s at least a small consolation after this far from positive afternoon.”

Team mate Felipe Massa, who has been under fire all through 2011 and 2012 so far for his performance, agreed that the cars are capable of much more, and that the qualifying results does not give a clear picture of the potential possible.

“It’s really frustrating ending up outside Q3 by less than a tenth,” said Massa.

“It was a very close qualifying, with so many drivers very near to one another in performance terms: in Q2, we were three tenths off the fastest time and we were eliminated…A shame because the feeling from the car was very good and I always felt comfortable and capable of fighting with the best. The position does not tell the truth: today we were worth a place in the top three rows. With hindsight, it’s easy to say that if we had used two sets of Soft in Q2, we could have made the cut, but we wanted to be in the best possible shape for Q3 and Q1 had shown that we were even quick on the Medium tyre.

“Tomorrow, strategy will play a very important role and we have seen on several occasions – Canada being the last one – how even those who start from the back have a chance of fighting for the top places. Obviously, we are not happy today, but we know we have a good car and we still have every chance of securing a good result.”