Vettel pips Alonso to Hockenheim pole

2010 German Grand Prix qualifying

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Sebastian Vettel beat Fernando Alonso to pole position by just two thousandths of a second at the Hockenheimring.

Felipe Massa underlined Ferrari’s improved pace by taking third place, capitalising on a mistake by Mark Webber who will start fourth.

Q1

The first part of qualifying was only five minutes old when Vitantonio Liuzzi brought it to an early halt. He lost his car at the final corner and hit the concrete barrier in front of the pit wall in a crash not dissimilar to Timo Glock’s during the 2008 race.

And it was Glock who had to brake and swerve to avoid the front wheel which was torn off Liuzzi’s car.

Race control swiftly red-flagged the session to recover Liuzzi’s car and clean up the track.

Lewis Hamilton was among the first of the cars to go quickest when the session re-started, before heading back to the pits.

His mark was beaten by the two Red Bulls and finally Fernando Alonso, who set a new best time of the weekend with a 1’14.808.

Unsurprisingly it was the three new teams’ cars that were eliminated along with Liuzzi. Both Virgin drivers are expected to take five-place penalties for gearbox changes, as is Adrian Sutil.

Q2

Most of the front-runners did their first runs on hard tyres but Felipe Massa was a notable exception, setting the fastest time to begin with on super-soft tyres.

But when his rivals switched to super-soft tyres towards the end of the session he was demoted – with team mate Alonso fastest once again on a 1’14.081.

The fight to escape the drop zone was closely-fought – especially between the Mercedes drivers. Nico Rosberg edged Michael Schumacher by eight-thousandths of a second, and Schumacher was ultimately knocked out by the improving Williams of Nico H?�??lkenberg.

The Saubers, Toro Rossos, Vitaly Petrov and Adrian Sutil were also eliminated ahead of the top-ten shoot-out.

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Q3

Alonso struck the first blow in the final part of qualifying with Vettel unable to beat his first effort on the super-soft tyres.

But when they came out for the last runs Vettel turned the table – setting a 1’13.791 which Alonso got within 0.002s of beating.

Webber might have joined his team mate on the front row but he ran wide at turn one on his first lap and had to abort his lap. That allowed Massa to take third place off him.

Jenson Button turned the tables on his team mate with his last effort, edging Hamilton by a tenth of a second on his final run.

See how the grid will look after penalties here: German Grand Prix grid

Full qualifying times

Pos.#DriverCarQ1

Q2

Q3
15Sebastian VettelRed Bull-Renault1’15.1521’14.2491’13.791
28Fernando AlonsoFerrari1’14.8081’14.0811’13.793
37Felipe MassaFerrari1’15.2161’14.4781’14.290
46Mark WebberRed Bull-Renault1’15.3341’14.3401’14.347
51Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Mercedes1’15.8231’14.7161’14.427
62Lewis HamiltonMcLaren-Mercedes1’15.5051’14.4881’14.566
711Robert KubicaRenault1’15.7361’14.8351’15.079
89Rubens BarrichelloWilliams-Cosworth1’16.3981’14.6981’15.109
94Nico RosbergMercedes1’16.1781’15.0181’15.179
1010Nico H?�??lkenbergWilliams-Cosworth1’16.3871’14.9431’15.339
113Michael SchumacherMercedes1’16.0841’15.026
1223Kamui KobayashiSauber-Ferrari1’15.9511’15.084
1312Vitaly PetrovRenault1’16.5211’15.307
1414Adrian SutilForce India-Mercedes1’16.2201’15.467
1522Pedro de la RosaSauber-Ferrari1’16.4501’15.550
1617Jaime AlguersuariToro Rosso-Ferrari1’16.6641’15.588
1716Sebastien BuemiToro Rosso-Ferrari1’16.0291’15.974
1818Jarno TrulliLotus-Cosworth1’17.583
1919Heikki KovalainenLotus-Cosworth1’18.300
2024Timo GlockVirgin-Cosworth1’18.343
2121Bruno SennaHRT-Cosworth1’18.592
2215Vitantonio LiuzziForce India-Mercedes1’18.952
2320Sakon YamamotoHRT-Cosworth1’19.844
2425Lucas di GrassiVirgin-Cosworth

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2010 German Grand Prix

Browse all 2010 German Grand Prix articles

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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101 comments on “Vettel pips Alonso to Hockenheim pole”

  1. Are McLaren still sand bagging or is Alonso just fast?

    1. Sand-bagging in qualifying? I doubt it.

      1. only on qually i know that hamilton is really great but has no chance of wining.i think this gp may be the step forward needed to reach the redbull.Ferrari is fast like all gp in this year but the turkey gp. lets see if ferrari bahrain luck comes back to reduce the possible gap between red bull and mclaren so mclarens can stay in the lead doing the impossible beeting red bull and ferrari and not having the pace

      2. But You’ve shaved .08 off Button’s advantage there, it should be .14 secs, no?

        My first ever “nyeeer nee nyeeer ne nyeer Keith you typed something wrong” post and it feels just as dirty, inane and pointless as I thought it would.

        I’m off to have a shower.

        1. Button was indeed .139 of a second faster.

        2. Fixed it, thanks.

      3. yep, sandbagging in quali would be extremly stupid :) i see no point is SB in quali!

    2. to be honest ferrari is quicker than mclaren (ham and alo) lets watch the race to see if mclaren can make another unbelieveble race and snatch some points mclaren has new updates car is always evolving and ferrari has a really new front wing and rain

  2. Mclaren aren’t sandbagging. They just need to find the sweet spot of their EBD.

    1. The straight-line speeds look interesting for the race:

      Vettel – 310kph
      Alonso – 306kph
      Massa – 307kph
      Webber- 307kph
      Button- 316kph
      Hamilton – 315kph

      1. As I said in the lifeblog, Keith do you think they set up the car to be overtaking monsters?

        I wonder if they thought they would get more downforce, and accompanying drag, from the EBD and thus tuned down the wings – leaving them a bit short of Red Bull and Ferrari, or if they made a choice to go for a setup that allowed them to use their biggest advantage of straight-line speed even if it would cost them a bit in other parts of the track.

        Even if it is the latter, I guess they underestimated how much downforce they might need to compete at the front.

        1. On the face of it I’d say no – if they knew they could out-qualify the others that’s what they’d go for.

          1. Though Button argued earlier that grid position is less important at this circuit with plenty of chances of overtaking. I imagine McLaren are confident of race pace and being able to overtake one or two of those in front at least.

          2. I agree. They wil not get close enough to VET and ALO to overtake them. The only chance is SC. After SC maccas can attack :)

          3. Keith’s right. It would be a strange strategy indeed to limit their setup for qualifying in hopes of overtaking in the race. Certainly Vettel doesn’t think it’s all that easy to overtake here from his last comment in the press conference.

        2. I just think McLaren never really got to find a perfect setup for qualifying, they spent all FP sessions on getting the EBD to work and setup for the race.
          Maybe they sacrificed a bit of downforce to go faster on the straights because they were afraid of getting passed by other cars if they did not do that.

      2. wow, I’m very glad theres two cars between Alonso and the Mclarens on the grid after seeing that

      3. the reason why Mclaren have higher top speed is cause they lack downforce…

        ideally i’d keep top speed capped around 305 or so… and prefer more downforce & traction coming out of the corners…

        1. Monza and Spa would be very boring then.

          1. only on like this track, monza needs more top speed.

        2. Not necessarily. They’ve got the best-functioning F-Duct remember.

          1. i remember Button say it few weeks ago, their higher top speed is mainly cause it lack downforce… when compared to Red Bull.

            on this track if the car is perfect through sector 3 then car can deliver a great lap time, both in qualifying and race… need downforce, strong acceleration, good braking stability & balance..

      4. Given their impressive straight-line speed, I guess McLaren are losing quite some time in the final sector. Is that so?

        1. Yep, they are super in S2, but S3 they loose quite a bit to Alonso and the Red Bulls.

      5. From Hamilton’s comments, it appears that they don’t have (efficient) downforce to add to the car. So this speed trap advantage does not show that there is cornering performance on hand from adding wing. But, if their race pace is good, they could be in for some passes.

        Morning rain may cancel out the “clean side” advantage, and Vettel has not been starting too hot lately.

        1. The McLarens might have the straight line speed, but if they can’t corner fast enough they won’t be able to get close enough at the start of the straight.

          I think that’s what Button said when he had a much higher speed on the straight (in Spain?) and he couldn’t get past Schumacher all race long. he just couldn’t line up to him in the last corner.

    2. Maybe McLaren haven’t got the gadget that Red Bull and now apparently Ferrari have that gives a constant feed of exhaust gases to the diffuser.

      1. That is possible, especially if you remember Button complaining of rear end instability (which happens when lifting off the throttle).

        One good thing is that the McLarens run better when loaded up with fuel and the time differential to the Red Bulls in a race is much less than in qualifying…

        1. http://www.motorsport-total.com/f1/news/2010/07/Ferrari_kopiert_Red_Bulls_Qualifying-Trick_10072410.html
          … ends with saying that according to “Diario Sport” Ferrari did try it this weekend. Not much, but seems possible that is finally the to-have item then.

          1. Thanks bosyber, I got as far as ‘Ferrari kopiert Red Bulls Qualifying-Trick’ – says enough though! Precisely my thoughts watching.

            Presumably this is German for blown diffusor:
            ‘auspuffangeblasenen Diffusor’. Brilliant! Why use 5 letters when you can have 19?

          2. To be fair, ‘auspuffangeblasen’ means ‘exhaust pipe blown’ if you translate if you translate it by the Oxford English Dictionary .. which is 16 letters plus two spaces. So, not much of a difference, is there?!

          3. @ bananarama

            Fair enough! It’s the great thing about German though, it’s like you’ve got the entire car assembly instructions contained in the name of the parts! :0)

          4. But it seems Ferrari only tested it. And from the times in those sessions, you can see that Vettel got faster in Q3 again to beat Alonso.

            Interesting news notheless.

            @David BR – yes, German has this great combining of words to say it all in a (long) go.

          5. It seemed as though Ferrari were running it as well. I can’t imagine Alonso would be within 2 1000ths if they weren’t.

            German truly is a wonderful language. This is 1 word:
            donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftsraddampferkapitänskajütentürsicherheitsschlüssel

      2. That constant exhaust feed only makes up for about a tenth of a second at best.

        There were a lot of poor Q3 laps this time round though. Only Vettel, Alonso and Button improved on their Q2 times.

        Guess the stress got to most of them and they tried to hard.

        1. I hadn’t realized that they were the only three to improve. It was great to see Button out-qualify Hamilton again for the first time in a long time.

    3. Do Macca really need the EBD? The qualifying gap to RBR is more or less the same as in Silverstone, where they didnt run it. Methinks it is upsetting the cars balance too much. I hope they dont go down the same avenue as Ferrari did with the F-Duct – focusing all attention on getting the EBD to work, at the detriment of improving the car as a whole.

  3. Ferrari is looking good! Alonso might win this one tomorrow.
    The blown diffuser doesn’t seem to be working for the Mclarens

    1. To be honest this seems like our (ferrari) best chance. If they dont get close to winning then i doubt we will get a better chance. Im hoping we’ll get a podium and a nice clutch of points.

  4. The Red Bulls have been caught by the red horses, mclaren left in the dust for now…best news of the season so far!!!

    1. Suggest watching the race tomorrow first!

  5. ExplosiveFace
    24th July 2010, 14:29

    Goddammit, I didn’t know One HD were showing this delayed. Kinda ruins it.

    1. I hear you loud and clear mate… :(

  6. So Jenson finally beats Lewis in qualy again. Good for him. Lewis please don’t clout him when you try to pass him at the start thx.

    1. Must be very interesting in tomorrow race to see if Hamilton can overtake Button!

      1. Its going to be very interesting WHEN Lewis overtakes Jenson

        1. It’s going to be very insteresting when Hamilton tried to pass Button and both collide. ;)

    2. Haha yeah. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Lewis push his way past at the first corner, potentially knocking Jenson out the way. It sure will be a pretty exciting first lap tomorrow.

      The BBC said Senna’s qualifying was disappointing, but isn’t that the highest on the grid an HRT car has been all season? Plus he was nearly 1.4 seconds faster than his team-mate…

    3. What do you mean by that You obviously watch a different Formula 1 when has lewis ever clouted Jenson this year?????

  7. Congrats to RBR, Vet, Alo, But, Bru, Kob and Alg. Glad Liuzzi seems ok.

    I was mega, mega impressed with Fernando today to the point where I may end up using more superlatives about him than JA does about Hamilton. To get so close and his teammate was quite some way off and I didn’t think Massa did too badly.

    Alonso was my man of the day. He wasn’t fighting Vettel for pole he was fighting that RB6. Vettel’s a damn good driver and clearly had the edge on Mark today but Alonso just should not have been that close to that car.

    1. Lol “I may end up using more superlatives about him than JA does about Hamilton”

    2. It was a magic performance. He’s been properly on it all weekend.

      In some ways I kinda wish it was more like a 1 or 2 tenth gap, but two thousandths? Arghhh!

      /frustration.

      Was a good session all round though and the race tomorrow should be interesting – Red Bull have tended to be slower than their qualifying pace suggests and Ferrari and McLaren have often been faster.

    3. Aww… Aren’t you one happy girl today?… :)

    4. How do you know he shouldn’t be that close in that car?

      The Ferrari has been fast all weekend, in fact I’d say it’s probably faster in race (and RBR have the EBD working better for qualy)

      1. Vikas- encouraged. Quali doesn’t get points :p

        Tom- one word : Newey. Ferrari has upgrades and this track suits them but look at the difference to Massa who (I don’t think) made any obvious mistakes.

        That rb6 was made for pole. It was like Ham who went above and beyond at Canada.

        I expect Ferrari to be quicker during the race but I was solely looking at qualifying.

        1. Well, you cannot go quicker than the limit of the car, so if Alonso was on the limit, Massa was half a second off the limit of his car unless he´s got a worse set-up than Alonso. He has to improve, P3 looks good on paper but half a second is a lot. :(

  8. what are the smallest gap in qualifying ? other than jerez 1997 ?

    1. Likely that this was closest after Jerez 1997.

      2 thousandths translates to 12.397 centimeters in my calculation. Too close!!

      1. Monza 2006 was the same, with Raikkonen pipping Michael Schumacher by 2 thousandths.

  9. Williams :D!

    nice to see how much they improved over the last few races…

    1. yeah it’s so nice to see.
      They need to be a top contender again.
      The heritage and name just screams racing!

  10. Now that it looks as though Ferrari has finally poised itself to begin taking points away from McLaren and BB (probably in that order) for some of the remaining races, this could get very interesting :)

    1. oops. Make that RB

  11. I wish Alonso wins this one. He has a great car and he lost by 2 thousandth of a second…. He is Fast..

  12. Man of the Day Vettel….Front of Home croud and under tremendous Pressure…Vettel Delivers….I hope he wins tomorrow

  13. Interesting that places 5-10 were .1-.4 seconds slower in Q3, while the opposite was true for the top 3 and Button (Webber was a tad slower in Q3 due to the mistake).

  14. I reckon that, had Alonso gone straight towards start-finish instead of swerve to the middle of the track, with such a smalle difference, he would have had pole position in the bag.

    1. I thought that too, but perhaps he took the last corner in such a way that the inertia carried him to the inside of the track and to straighten up would have scrubbed off too much speed. Or perhaps he simply put a little too much throttle on or simply wasn’t thinking!

      1. or simply wasn’t thinking… he needs 12,4cm less.

  15. Whatever happened to Mercedes. On friday they seems bullish about this race prospects

    1. They had to be up for it for the sake of the fans at the home race.

  16. Mercedes – ouch! This would be the time to pull the plug on this season and design a new car from the ground up for next year. Pleasantly surprised to see Williams showing progress. Ferrari makes things interesting for the rest of season.

    1. their base car is a big problem… no matter what they add to the car… the base car won’t change… they should have stuck with what they know & evolved their last years car further….. they clearly now should focus on 2011 car.

      1. Unless there´s something fundamentally wrong with how they are using the wind tunnel or something like that. Then next year´s car will be as bad unless they find the problem immediately.

    2. If you think back over the history of the Mercedes team, they have never been particularly strong at developing the car. Last year McLaren gained something like 2.5 seconds on Brawn over the course of the season, which for a front-running team is pretty dreadful. And they only started last year with an all-conquering car because they were able to run four wind tunnels during the 2008/9 close season.

      Unless they manage to produce something brilliant for the start of next season, I don’t see them fighting for the championship in any case.

  17. Interesting quali and excellent drive by Vettel but I can’t understand why so many are supprised by ferrari. Since Valencia they have been quick. They have lost points due to stupidity and bad luck. RBR have been the team of the year and have not translated this into points and while Mclaren have been very competative they have been by far the luckiest team out there.

    1. I would say that I wasn’t so much surprised that they were fast, as relieved that Red Bull didn’t just find a new tweak to go even faster on a Saturday. I am very happy that Ferrari finally manages to get both drivers to do a good job again and take it to Red Bull. They need this, and they can get it this time, no stupid things happening to ruin the race.

    2. Good job from Ferrari, your right they have improved the car to go where it is now.
      In Valencia they brought the key improvements, but they did not yet use them to full effect, and the race was a shame because of the SC.

      In Silverstone it worked as wanted in Qualli, but both Alonso and Massa shot themselves in the foot (puncture and not letting Kubica back past).

      Now they have the package right and were able to use it to maximum effect. Red Bull couldn’t counter even with the retarded ignition trick and McLaren are still learning to use their updates. This is Ferrari’s chance to gain the momentum for the next races.

  18. awesome to see Ferrari back up in front,
    with Vettel just nipping Alonso for pole means poor Alonso is likely to be beaten to the first corner due to starting on the dirty side of the track, with Webber and Lewis following suit.
    that side of the track is hardly used at all if you take a good look.
    Vettel, Massa, Button all will possible get away better.

    i predict Hamilton to chase down some of those front runners with his higher end top speed and pass them, would love to see Button do the same but not sure he will risk it.

    i hope for Ferrari that Alonso brings this one home.
    if Massa can hang in there as well it would be a excellent improvement for all the hard work the Ferrari team has done to get the car back on track, considering all the bad luck they have had, yeah i know some of it was there own fault.

  19. Ferrari have got 2 full races worth of integrating and refining EBD to their car over Mclaren, as a result they will have altered it and made the rear of the car more stable, and they will have been able to continue with other development areas. Mclaren have spent the last two weeks trying to sort one problem and probably haven’t paid as much attention to other areas of development. Redbull already had a perfect EBD but do not seem as far ahead on Hockenheim. If I was at Mclaren I would be disappointed to be the 3rd team, but not to downheartened to know that my car has always been impeccable during race day.

  20. Im really glad to see that the Ferraris and Mclarens are close to the RBR because im tired of seeing that team(RBR) have success especially after last race’s stupid drama. Vettels annoying… end of story…Theyre like watching a soap opera. I want Massa and Ham to do well but i really want to see Jenson win… GO JENSON!

    Congrats to Jarno Trulli! almost a second faster than Heikki and though hes a second and a half behind the torro rossos it seems that there is some potential for speed in that lotus

  21. It is misleading to look at the difference in qualy times. McLaren behaves very well with full fuel.

    The 2 important factors that will impact the race are

    1. Will Alonso and Vettel get too far ahead before the McLaren’s make their way past anyone inbetween.
    2. Will the McLarens get super competitive against each other?

    My guess is atleast one of the McLarens is going to make it to the podium even if they might not win the race. Alonso seems set to win the race tomorrow. Finally a much needed Ferrari win is on cards.

  22. .6s is about how far back McLaren has been behind RBR in Q3 most of the year. And Hamilton was actually slower in Q3 indicating some kind of mess up—he appeared to be, as usual, about .3s up on Button throughout the weekend. I expect it to be a very tight race.

    1. It was 0.941sec at Silverstone (but that was a longer lap in terms of time)

  23. I wish that any team other than Red Bull to win the race. I am just so sick of seeing them winning.

    1. May be this time it may be a Ferrari of Alonso who may turn your wish into reality but the thing is in the last two races we saw that their pace on Sunday is different then from Saturday.

  24. Mclaren are not sandbagging, but they are the second fastest team, the reason because their qualifying pace, is average (compared to RBR) but their race pace is very strong, and they are reliable which is why they are 1st and 2nd and leading the constructors championship… And that’s why Mclaren are bringing these developments out, not to improve their race pace, but to improve their qualifying pace. Look back to China Jenson & Lewis fastest in FP1 FP2 SP Q1 Q2 and then suddenly lost grip and then started in 5th&6th, that’s evident how poor Mclaren are in Qualifying. But considering their poor starting positions (excluding Canada) Mclarens race pace has always got them out of tricky situations. Like Turkey they stayed with Red Bull for 40 laps and Lewis was always a second or less behind them, so it is clear they have pace, they just don’t show it on a Saturday, also i believe Lewis and Seb would of had a great battle in Valencia, but then Fernando complained. So this is what i come to expect from Mclaren and tomorrow at turn 2 and turn 4 expect Jenson and Lewis to be challenging for 1st or 2nd, because they are 5/6 KPH faster on a straight.

    1. Lewis wasn’t penalised cos Fernando complained, he was penalised cos he broke the rules.

      McLaren have had the second fastest car more often than not, but aside from a couple of races, Ferrari (read:Alonso) have had a car that’s just as quick. Now that they have an EBD that’s been run for two races and a decent amount of setup information they’re able to exploit it and should be able to usurp McLaren as the second fastest team, possibly even proving faster than Red Bull.

      McLaren meanwhile need to gain more knowledge on the EBD and on top of that have to sort out the whole engine retardation thing than RBR and now Ferrari seem to have. The wet running in practice wont have helped this and in my opinion it could be a little while before they can use it to maximum effectiveness and get back to the top. Having the extra few kph advantage wont rocket them to the front of the field if they cant manage a decent overall laptime.

  25. This does not bode well for McLaren mid season. They are going down the same route as Ferrari did with the F-Duct – focusing all resources into making the EBD work to the detriment of developing other areas of the car. At this stage of the championship, this may cost them dear.

    The gap to the Red Bulls is approx 7/10ths; more or less what it was in Silverstone – and they didnt run it there!They have no hope of catching the Red Bulls in the race. Massa is their only potential casualty, as the car in Alonso hands look too good in race trim.

    I predict Lewis to jump Jenson at the start(he always jumps someone), maybe Massa too. He should look out for Massa though, as Massa has a habit of putting his car into invisible spaces at the start. The best Macca can hope for is 4th and 5th. The Red Bulls have this one im afraid, and Alonso will be looking to make the podium – come hell or high water.

    1. Though Jenson has been fairly nifty off the grid too recently, albeit from further back. I expect both McLarens to be pushing, though I’d be wary about colliding with Webber…

      As for McLaren development, this time they should get a full race of EBD data to work with. And presumably they have their own engine late-burn doodah system to install when the basic system is up and running. It’s an area where they can gain a lot of potential for further development, why not focus on it?

    2. If Ferrari have afterburners this thickens the plot because it represents a qualification-only advantage. But I don’t think so. Ferrari’s practice pace looked very good. I had suggested before that if RBR is in a true scrap they may be forced to light up their exhausts during the race raising both fuel consumption and reliability issues. Fuel is curious issue this year. We saw in Valencia how Hamilton was able to go to “yellow G 1” and give a massive burst of speed before his penalty. The cars pace may be consumption limited overall.

  26. In the press conference, Sebastian Vettel describes the tyre degradation on the harder tyre: When you change to the hard tyre you know that you can drive this one to Hungary without any problems

    Love this comment from him. Bridgestone have really over-done their preparedness for 2010. Good that ehy are leaving now. Pirelli with no experience of making F1-spec tyres for 10-12 years (or more?) will make less durable tyres for sure.

    1. yeah, on thursday Kubica predicted that hard tyres will drive for infitenumber of laps :)

      1. *infinite number

  27. i wish i can see a ferrari 1-2 tomorw…

  28. Hmm, interesting situation tmr. Yes, true that mclaren race pace is good, but we shall see if it will be better tmr. Ferrari could be vulnerable @ start if the rumor of their engine being super fuel thirsty is true. that will add alot of weight to the car.

    Anyway, if im nt wrong, mclaren strong race pace has to do with the weight distribution which indirectly affects downforce. When race fuel load is high, their rear end is far more stable n has more downforce then when it is lighter. this will mainly explain the reason for good race pace but wk qualy pace. So, yea, its nt a problem that can be solved v easily, as it involves weight distribution of the car.

    Still looking forward towards tmr strong race n super competitve front.

  29. German — 1:13.791 — 1:14.427 — +0.636
    British — 1:29.615 — 1:30.556 — +0.941
    European — 1:37.587 — 1:37.969 — +0.382
    Canadian — 1:15.420 — 1:15.105 — -0.315
    Turkish — 1:26.295 — 1:26.433 — +0.138
    Monaco — 1:13.826 — 1:14.432 — +0.606
    Spainish — 1:19.995 — 1:20.829 — +0.834

    I don’t think its all doom for Mclaren, look at Silverstone and the Spainish GP, in both Hamilton ran comfortably 2nd even though he was over 0.83 behind in qualifying, and Jenson was only 0.636 behind today.

    Looking at Ferrari and their first attempts with the EBD and today them running with the engine retardation thingy, plus RBRs general pace in qualifying against race pace (and FP low fuel pace) it seems this trick is worth about 0.4 in qualifying but not run in the race.

    Mclaren are stronger on full tanks as well so it could be very interesting tomorrow, a three team race?

  30. I hate this “finger boy” :) really…
    Good job by Ferrari. Nice by Kubica too, but the gap to “top 3” is quite big.

  31. People speak of Mclaren falling behind and not performing well at today’s qualifying. The fact of the matter is, Ferrari have improved massively and are where Mclaren would be. Let’s not forget in this competitive field 4th and 5th still a decent result.

    I honestly thought Alonso would get it today! 2 thousandths of a second!! Vettel must have driven a peach of a last sector as he was still behind Alonso at the end of sector 2. A popular result will be that Williams are up there with the big boys for the 3rd race running, so it’s clear the car is looking good and it’s not down to luck.

  32. To add, I know I harp on about Legard but the commentary today was dire. No hype whatsoever in Q3 when everyone was coming in at the end, whilst i’m sat there thinking “THE WHOLE WEEKEND IS DETERMINED BY THIS YOU PILLOCK!”. To be fair he got out of his seat a bit when Vettel and Alonso crossed the line but that was about a month after the time came up.

    Also the “Look at Alonso! He’s four tenth’s quicker than anyone else!” annoyed me at the start of Q3, because it was actually less than tenth than anyone else looking at Q2 times.

    “It’s not looking good for nico rosberg is it…” When he was on his inlap. Even Brundle )who stays quiet when Legard flops these days) stepped in to correct him…

    There were other moments as well but I don’t want to turn this into a bigger rant ;)

  33. Great work by the Ferrari team but in the last two races we saw that their race pace deteriorate as they progress to the race.I think Hamilton have done the best he could but Webber was disappointing.

    Again Schumacher fails to clear Q2 I think that the more races is going the more weaker the Mercedes car is getting,Kobayashi made a mistakes or else I think he could have been there in Q3.I think it will be a exciting race tomorrow (today).

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