Australian GP: Qualifying Report

You couldn’t have asked for a better Qualifying session to start the season. The pre-season testing posed many questions for the teams along with it some clear front runners for the first race. But while it was clear there were teams and drivers who had an edge over the rest, rain added much more spice to the Qualifying session after a dry third free-practice session. Here’s how the Qualifying session unfolded.

Qualifying 1

It was a bad at the office for Lotus as both drivers Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado failed to go past Q1.

The drama was on as soon as the green lights went out on the 18 minute session mandated by the new rules As dark clouds began to gather around Albert Park, it went even darker for Lotus. Pastor Maldonado wasn’t able to do a timed lap despite an attempt (that saw him take trips on to the grass) and Romain Grosjean struggled back to the pits after 6 laps and being quite vocal about it on the radio. It was an extension of the problems that the Enstone team had faced all through the testing.

As rain came down it was a trip back to the pits for most cars. Not before Daniel Ricciardo had set the fastest lap time pushing Mclaren rookie Kevin Magnussen to second with a 1m 30.775s. Fernando Alonso (Ferrari), Felipe Massa (Williams) and Jenson Button (Mclaren) completed the top 5. Kamui Kobayashi in the Caterham and on his Formula One return made it into Q2 on the back of a decent run after having missed both the free-practice sessions yesterday. Max Chilton in the Marussia finished ahead of his teammate Jules Bianchi who had out-qualified him last season and the Williams of Esteban Gutierrez. The Williams couldn’t recover from a gearbox problem despite a change after the free-practice session earlier in the day and earned him a 5 place grid penalty. Marcus Ericcson in the second Caterham with his lap of 1m 35.157s managed to stay ahead of Grosjean and his beleaguered teammate Maldonado .

Qualifying 2

Four-time World Champion, Sebastian Vettel struggled with his Red-Bull and failed to make it to Q3 for the first time since the 2012 Belgian GP.

Q2 was of 15 minutes and was a tricky session as the track started to dry up in patches with pools of water on some parts. Teams went ahead with Pirelli intermediaries. The varying conditions had immediate impact as the lap times started to tumble. Alonso topped the sheets followed by Ricciardo before Nico Rosberg made a dash for the finish line minutes before the end of the session and ended up being fastest. Sebasian Vettel though struggled throughout the session and he too failed in a last attempt to move on to Q3. Cheered on by the crowd after he crossed the line , the reason is anyone’s guess.

Meanwhile, Kimi Raikkonen had his moment as he crashed his front wing into the barriers after having gone into the top 10 but subsequently pushed down unable to better his time. Jenson Button in the second Mclaren failed to match his rookie teammate and he too went out of the session managing 11th at the end of the session. Adrian Sutil (Sauber) and Sergio Perez ( Force India) were the other two drivers who failed to make it to the final round of qualifying.

Qualifying 3

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg drivers finished impressively in Qualifying and home hero Daniel Ricciardo took the honors for Red-Bull.

The final session extended from 10 to 12 minutes had exciting driving with rain coming down and the teams going in for full wet-weather tyres initially and a few of them later switching to intermediaries. Both the Mercedes’ looked good for the front grid as Hamilton went fastest followed by a pumped up Rosberg. But three of them took turns in going fastest before Hamilton pipped the home hero cheered on by the crowd in the final seconds of the session.

Mclaren boy wonder Magnussen went fourth fastest followed by a not so happy Alonso in fifth.

The surprise package and more so because of the rain were the Toro Rossos with Jean-Eric Vergne (6th on the grid) and his rookie teammate Daniil Kvyat (8th) despite a close shave with the barriers. Nico Hulkenberg started from where he left last year with hard earned seventh for Force India.

A resurgent Felipe Massa in the Williams finished 9th and teammate Valtteri Bottas ended up 10th but the Finn will start further down the grid thanks to a 5 place grid penalty for a gearbox change.

An action packed Qualifying to say the least and tomorrow’s race promises to be a humdinger with the unpredictability still attached to the 2014 cars and rain predicted in Melbourne. A Super Sunday looks eminent with Formula One.

Here’s the order for tomorrow’s race.

1. Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes)

2. Daniel Ricciardo (Red-Bull)

3. Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)

4. Kevin Magunessen (Mclaren)

5. Fernando Alonso (Ferrari)

6. Jean-Eric Vergne( Toro-Rosso)

7. Nico Hulkenberg (Force-India)

8. Daniil Kvyat (Toro-Rosso)

9. Felipe Massa (Williams)

10. Jenson Button (Mclaren)

11. Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari)

12. Sebastian Vettel (Red-Bull)

13. Adrian Sutil (Sauber)

14. Kamui Kobayashi (Caterham)

15. Valtteri Bottas (Williams) – After grid penalty

16. Sergio Perez (Force-India)

17. Max Chilton (Marussia)

18. Jules Bianchi (Marussia)

19. Marcus Ericcson (Caterham)

20. Romain Grosjean (Lotus)

21. Esteban Gutierrez (Sauber) – After grid penalty

22. Pastor Maldonado (Lotus)