Malaysia: Qualifying Report

Malaysia saw the return of Fernando Alonso after his testing crash. In the press conference he blamed the cause of the crash on locked steering. In doing so he undermined McLaren’s comments that the car was not at fault, thus placing the blame on Alonso himself. McLaren’s verdict is in line with the FIA’s investigation into the crash and the data recorded from the incident therefore seemingly absolving them of blame.

On Friday Lewis Hamilton suffered from poor reliability in practice completing only 4 laps in Free Practice 1 and then further reliability issues kept him off track for 38 minutes of FP2 but still set the fastest time of the session.

Malaysia also saw the return of Bottas from his back injury. Meanwhile off track, the division between Red Bull and Renault seem to burst into the headlines with the head of Renault motorsport criticising Adrian Newey and threatening to leave the sport altogether or for Renault to return in the form of their own works team.

Malaysia marked the first outing for the Manor F1 team

The lightning made for a stunning backdrop to Q1. The session’s cut off lap time was 1:41:00 which saw Perez just make Q2. Manor made it onto the track for this weekend despite receiving fierce criticism from Bernie Ecclestone in the week for not having done so in Melbourne. Their driver Will Stevens failed to run altogether due to an issue with the car’s fuel system. Merhi was some 4 tenths outside of meeting the 107% rule but having appealed to the stewards, both Manors are permitted to race.

McLaren failed to reach Q2 by 5 tenths when Alonso failed to improve his lap time and subsequently qualified 18^th. Jenson Button will have been happy to beat his teammate by a tenth of a second but there was little else to comfort the McLarens.

Q2 started with scenes reminiscent of a supermarket car park as cars queued stationary in the pit lane. The aim was to set a dry lap before the storms arrived and not to get caught out as so often happens to the reactive and not proactive. So track position and clean air were essential meaning the teams released the cars early where they sat waiting for the green light at the pit exit marking the start of the session.

Queuing in Quali 2

Vettel made it to the front of the pack and took good use of the strategic advantage to set a lap quick enough for 2^nd place. There was only enough time for one dry lap before the storm arrived. Hamilton was stuck behind Raikkonen and was therefore 2 seconds shy of Rosberg’s fastest time in Q2. Hamilton arrived late and to the back of queue due to a struggle to start the power unit. Nasr was out in 16^th, Perez 15^th, Sainz 14^th. Toro Rosso had the pace to make Q3 so Sainz’s lap must have been disappointing. Hulkenberg qualified 13^th, Maldonado 12^th. The main story of Q2 was Raikkonen who qualified down in 11^th place and failed to make Q3. Ericsson reached Q2 and then Q3 for the first time in his Formula 1 career.

The spectators make a run for shelter as the clouds burst

As a result of Kimi’s plight, Arrivabene was once again seen deep in conversation with Raikkonen’s race engineer exploring the issues and conducting his own investigation like he had been seen doing back in Melbourne also. It seems as if the new Maranello team principal is leaving no stone unturned in his quest to take the prancing horses to the top of the time sheets once again. Whatsmore, it appears to be working as Ferrari have clearly improved for the 2015 season.

Q3 was delayed to allow the track to dry out and not risk aquaplaning. The Williams started on full wet tyres in an attempt to experiment for the fastest laps but soon changed to the Intermediate tyre compound as the Ferraris, Red Bulls and Mercedes were hugely faster on the green side walled tyre.

Notably, Nico Rosberg was reluctant to get out of the racing line and let Hamilton, on a flying lap, past. As a result Hamilton aborted his lap and impeded the clean air of Nico. This sort of on track behaviour certainly did not reflect their teammate status and was more reflective of the tensions in Monaco of last season.

Despite getting stuck behind Massa and not improving on his final lap, Lewis Hamilton grabbed pole position ahead of Vettel who split the Mercedes and was only a tenth of a second behind Hamilton.  Thus Vettel claimed 2^nd best out of the constructors for Ferrari behind the usual suspects; the Mercedes. The Red Bulls of Ricciardo and Kvyat claimed 4^th and 5^th some 1.6 seconds adrift. It also meant the top 3 qualifiers were the same as 2014. A fantastic drive from Verstappen saw him take 6^th place on the grid.

A proud dad in the background after a mighty lap from Max Verstappen

The Williams looked to suffer from poor downforce and only lined up 7^th place in Massa and 9^th for Bottas on his return from injury. In his first ever Q3 session Ericsson rounded off the top 10. Grosjean initially qualified in 8^th place but having left the pit lane incorrectly the stewards have subsequently dropped him to 10^th and the grid reordered accordingly.

Hamilton takes pole in Malaysia

With an 82% chance of a thunderstorm in tomorrow’s race, it will make for a real showcase to see if Hamilton and Mercedes's pace can translate also in wet weather conditions.