Well, as expected today was going to be all about tyres, so much so that the actual event of qualifying seemed to be a mere hindrance to an ongoing argument - but to settle that down for a bit Pirrelli have brought the hybrid spec constructions. These new tyres are lined with kevlar instead of metal, which SKY pointed out is the same material bullet proof vests and things are made of - so perfect for any races Bernie wants to hold in gangland territories. Also it does render the prospect of any theoretical boycott of the race rather moot, because there are no signs of failure despite the European heatwave causing some high temperatures at the track. In fairness nobody realistically expected things to be as dramatic as they were in Silverstone because that was an anomaly in extreme conditions. Furthermore an investigation into the explosions has revealed that the practice of swapping tyres from the right side onto the left side of the car to extend tyre life increased their vulnerability. So as a result Pirelli have banned that practice as well as setting limitations on camber and minimum pressure.
All that stuff about tyres is not terribly interesting despite how much coverage the issue has received in the past week - so time to refocus on the fact that there is a race weekend underneath it all. The most amusing development so far is that Alonso seems to have arrived disguised as a magician - or a circus ringmaster, the difference is negligible. I personally was not aware that the Ferrari team had employed a spontaneous fancy dress policy - but a little levity every now and again can't hurt. On the whole the balance of power seems very changeable this weekend, as temperatures changed due to cloud cover, different cars seemed to have more or less pace - but in the end it's the two teams that have benefited from the tyre debarcle that retain the final stranglehold on the top positions when the final flag waved.
Qualifying
Rather uncharacteristically the scene opened to a nurburgring bathed in sun, with only patchy cloud hovering around the mountains famed for rain and spontaneous showers, no such threat this time round. A slight shame as a little rain would be entertaining, and of course, there would be much less complaining about tyres is it did. Down in the garages most of the teams were just sitting around watching some allegedly important rugby match... which in itself sounds a little like an oxymoron, almost as if other sports matter - but what to I know. I assumed Alonso had used the power of illusion and suggestion to hypnotise everyone into thinking the session hadn't started. For the first few minutes it seemed to have worked.
The first man to break free from Fernando's magical hypnosis was Paul Di Resta for Force India and current bonus points leader who, sky revealed, made a total of 38 places this season from grid position - might explain where all those bonus points came from. But the scotsman's time was not particularly quick as was easily beaten - and for the first time in a very long time Williams were leading something, in fact it was a 1-2. The struggling team spent almost three minutes holding onto the top two places until Ricciardo still eyeing up Webber's 2014 seat used the softer compound to go fastest, even faster than the Mercedes of Rosberg on the medium tyres.
Some of the main contenders decided that the medium tyre wasn't worth using in this session - considering how well it was working for Mercedes losing time to the Torro Rosso. Ferrari and Lotus went to the softs and automatically went to the front, firstly the resident magician took Q1 pole before Raikkonen, who being unphased by bits of exploding tyres bouncing off his head in Britain was not going be influenced by Fernando's questionable facial hair - and stole the lead away. Down at the bottom of the field we found McLaren waiting until the end to set their times - when they did it dropped Williams into the relegation zone - from leading the session to seeing both cars knocked out with the smaller teams.
Straight into Q2 and Di Resta and Vergne opened the session with a middling pair of times, times that did not stand up to the challenge of the two Mercedes cars finding over a second on Vergne's opening effort. Hamilton now lead from Rosberg two just under two tenths down. While Red Bull sat in the garage waiting for the track to clear as the rest of the grid came in for new tyres. That window inevitable arrived with the Mercedes cars locking out the front of the time sheets... until of course the Red Bulls got the clear track they were looking for - and Vettel went fastest. At this point the session seemed a little too methodical with everyone running to form, so much so that Mercedes shut up shop on the basis of the second half of Q2 following the same pattern... or was it more Alonso trickery...
On track the temperature had started to rise, playing into the hands of Lotus and Ferrari, increasing the competitiveness of their machines - immediately illustrated by Grosjean setting purple sectors but losing a little by the end of the lap. Alonso then went fastest, only to be pipped by the second Ferrari of Felipe Massa - might have been a good time for Mercedes to leave the garage and defend their position... apparently not. Rosberg began to fall down the order as Ricciardo and Hulkenberg found more pace getting ever closer to relegation. A decent lap from Button placed the German in 10th the final qualification place for Q3... almost safe with only one more car left to set a time. The problem being that the remaining car belonged to Raikkonen, and he was in 11th at the time - which promptly became 2nd... and 11th for Rosberg and the pole contender was relegated. An audible sinister laugh was heard from Alonso's cabin, along with the sound of a rabbit being placed back into a top hat.
The predicted four way battle for the lead was now down to three contenders with Rosberg out - Ferrari went out on track first but only completed an installation lap each, only Raikkonen was really pushing the car at the very start of the session to set a decent opening benchmark. A benchmark that was not quite decent enough as Vettel knocked a third of a second off it to go fastest... but even that wasn't enough because the only remaining Mercedes went even faster to claim provisional pole position in the hands of Lewis Hamilton.
After a visit to the pits, it was time for round two - where interestingly Ferrari and Jenson had decided to compete for position on the slower, more durable tyre - sacrificing ultimate pace for an alternate race strategy. A plan which didn't last long for Button, who informed the team that he could not beat the Ferraris and gave up the qualifying effort and failed to set a time... haven't had one of those in a while. For a brief moment it seemed we would have a non-Mercedes on pole for once when Vettel reclaimed the top spot from Hamilton - that position came under-threat from Webber who set two really quick opening sectors but came across Alonso on the slower tyres in the final couple of corners and lost a couple of tenths to go third. But Hamilton was going even faster behind the lot of them and claimed another pole for Mercedes and his second in a row.
The bonus points championship points winners
Todays session may not have been particularly action packed, but the closeness of the times in Q2 was very impressive - 10 cars inside 0.4s of each other, and there is always room for bonus points.
- 10pts - Daniel Ricciardo - Another very impressive qualifying performance beating Ferrari and leading mid-field class
- 8pts - Nico Hulkenberg - For his strong Q2 performance, when things were so close to place 6th in that part of the session
- 6pts - Lewis Hamilton - Because that was a rather quick performace despite being off pace in the final practice sessions
- 5pts - Kimi Raikkonen - The only car to stick with the top two teams in Q3
- 4pts - Williams - For leading something for a bit, even if it was a tiny fraction of Q1
- 3pts - Romain Grosjean - Another strong display from the Frenchman
- 2pts - Fernando Alonso - For the very suspicious disguise carved into his face this weekend
- 1pt - Charles Pic - For winning the bottom division
The Penalty Points championship points winners
It has been a while since I've needed to penalise people for not taking part in the last phase of qualifying but there are two of those points to go out this time around
- Jenson Button - for not playing in Q3
- Nico Hulkenberg - for not playing in Q3
Looking to Tomorrow
Now we may not have any threat of rain, or a massively jumbled grid - but what we do have is a series of cars with vastly differing race and qualifying speeds, meaning that although the grid may have formed for the most part in a respective order, that order may not be the one on raceday. For example Mercedes might fall back towards Red Bull and Ferrari may move forwards on their alternate strategy of starting on the mediums, and of course there is the small matter of Rosberg and potentially the Force Indias being out of place. We know how much Di Resta likes coming through the field after a challenging Saturday, the allure of bonus points is a powerful force.
Looking at the GP2 and GP3 support races there seems to be a high change of an opening lap safety car, as both their races featured one - in GP2 that was due to a car being flipped on the main straight and rolling into another stalled car. While in GP3 it was deployed to cover a series of accidents - one of which almost lead to another upside down race car in the final chicane. Therefore the prospect of a simple lights to flag drive for Hamilton and a simple, calm, and uneventful race is definitely not an inevitability. It may not be an immediate season highlight with the threat of rain completely removed,, but this years German GP could be a very interesting affair indeed. So until tomorrow this is farewell from blog HQ.
No comments:
Post a Comment