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Kimi Raikkonen qualified ninth for the
second round of the world championship, while Felipe Massa
is down on the ninth row in sixteenth spot. To put it
bluntly, it is not a promising first step for tomorrow’s
Malaysian Grand Prix.
An assumption as to the state of the track
surface and the strength of the opposition meant that the
Scuderia’s qualifying was immediately on the back foot right
from the start of the session. It put both its drivers
straight out on track as the lights went out in case the
threat of rain – a few drops had fallen in the run up to the
session – turned into reality. Running on new sets of the
softer tyre, this in itself was not a bad decision, but
while other teams immediately set off on second and even
third runs as track conditions got drastically quicker, the
Ferrari strategy was aimed at saving new tyres for the
remainder of qualifying. While the tactical error was
spotted in time for Kimi to scrape through to Q2 and
eventually Q3, Felipe was caught out and his afternoon’s
work ended with the flag to end Q1. Ninth out of ten in Q3
for the Finn? He reckons the Ferrari F60 is currently not at
the pace of the quickest, at least over the single lap
required for a qualifying time.
And again here in Malaysia, the quickest man
was Jenson Button, who took his second consecutive pole
position for the Brawn GP team. Second was the Toyota of
Jarno Trulli. Third quickest on the timing screen was
Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull Renault, but the German has
to take a ten place grid penalty tomorrow for driving
infringements committed in the Melbourne race. Rubens
Barrichello was fourth in the second Brawn, but the
Brazilian also faces a penalty, this time five places, for
having required a gearbox change. Timo Glock was fifth
fastest for Toyota, with Nico Rosberg sixth in the Williams
Toyota. But the penalties mean that behind Button and Trulli
on the front row, the second row now features Glock and
Rosberg, while row 3 now sees Mark Webber in the Red Bull
Renault promoted two places to fifth, with the BMW of Robert
Kubica moved up to sixth, with Kimi gaining two places to
start seventh.
The weather is the big question mark for
tomorrow and today a heavy shower hit the track around 7 in
the evening, which if it did the same on Sunday would be
after the race finish. If the weather upsets team
strategies, then at least the tyres should not do so, as
both types brought here by Bridgestone seem to work fine
over a long run, whereas in Melbourne the super-softs had an
unexpectedly short life. The Ferrari duo will also be hoping
to exploit their KERS, particularly at the start, given that
this modern circuit is very wide, making for several passing
opportunities just after five o’clock tomorrow afternoon.
“This result is definitely not up
to our expectations, even if we knew it would be a difficult
qualifying,” commented the Scuderia’s Team Principal,
Stefano Domenicali. “However the aspect that really leaves a
bitter taste in the mouth is the way in which we tackled the
first part of the session. We made a false assumption that
cost us dear with Felipe, who was immediately out, failing
to make the first cut. Tomorrow, it will be a long and
difficult race, with a question mark over the weather which
can change really quickly. We will have to make the most of
our race pace and the start: in Australia, we saw that
anything can happen and we will have to be ready to pounce
on every opportunity, with the obvious proviso that we
cannot make any more mistakes.”
Kimi Raikkonen: “Honestly, the main
problem is that, at the moment, we are not quick enough to
fight for the top places. The car is not lacking in any
particular area, but we do not have enough grip to be as
quick as those who finished ahead of us today. Tomorrow’s
race will be very tough. We will try to make the most of the
start. In Australia, it was very good but there was nowhere
to go, whereas here, the straight is long and the track is
wide. Furthermore, as we saw yesterday, our pace is
competitive. We have to improve our performance but
obviously, it is important to have the regulations clarified
as quickly as possible, to understand in which direction to
go. Both types of tyres work well over a distance and we
will try and exploit that.”
Felipe Massa: “I am very
disappointed. If I had ended up sixteenth because of a lack
of performance, then I could have accepted the result, but
like this it hurts even more. The track improved so much
with each passing lap and my first run was not perfect and
nor was it enough. We did not react in time and lost the
chance to have another go. No one person is to blame: we are
a team and we lose or win all together. We have to change
our approach and tackle qualifying in a different way to the
past. There is no room for error and we have to give it our
all, right from the first session. Nevertheless, I am very
motivated. It won’t be the first time I will have to tackle
a race starting way down the order and I know I can count on
having a strong pace. We will have to try and exploit every
opportunity to make up places.”
Luca Baldisserri: “We opted to do
just one run on the new soft tyres in Q1 in order to save a
set for the following sessions and to do that run right at
the start of qualifying as we were worried about the threat
of rain. Then we did not react quickly enough in recognizing
that the track was improving much more than we had expected
and we watched our two drivers slide further and further
down the order, to such an extent that Felipe didn’t make it
to Q2. Now we have to concentrate on the race. We know our
potential over a distance is better than that shown over the
first lap and tomorrow we will have to make the most of
that.”
Qualifying session
Felipe Massa: 16th 1.35.642 4 laps
Kimi Raikkonen: 9th 1.36.170 6 laps
Chassis: F. Massa 275, K. Raikkonen 276
Weather: air temperature 31/30 °C, track
temperature 39/35 °C, partially cloudy.
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