It was a German driver on pole for the opener to this F1 season but it was 22 year old Vettel stealing all the headlines. After consistently being near the top of the timesheets in all three qualifying sessions, he produced a memorable lap to secure the first pole position of 2010. Behind him were the fast charging Ferrari’s but the surprise was that it was Massa who got the edge on Alonso.
In a season where there is a massive focus on the performance between team-mates, Massa took first blood over the Spaniard which must have been of some annoyance to Alonso. The double world champion had been faster than Massa in each session and looked favourite to win the battle to take the first position on the grid. However, Vettel’s Red Bull chose to spoil his plans and his lap time of 1:54.101 perhaps came as a small surprise to some people. Has the performance of Vettel and Red Bull been over looked in favour of all the hype concerning Ferrari, McLaren and Michael Schumacher?
Vettel spoke of his delight after claiming top spot in the all important first qualifying session of the year. “It is a big surprise, it was clear that there are four teams close to each other. Yesterday was tough and it was another long night, especially for the mechanics, but everybody was keen this morning. I knew we had a great car but you have to get it together. I am very happy to be on pole thanks to the team, it's a nice feeling to be on top."
The other Red Bull of Aussie Mark Webber could only manage 6th and will be wanting a much better race performance if he doesn’t want to let his team-mate take the early upper-hand in the team for 2010.
As part of the new regulations for this year, refuelling has gone, so the results of this qualifying session were a genuine reflection of speed. No more low fuelling to earn yourselves higher places on the grid, now what you see is what to expect in race conditions tomorrow.
How did the current world champion fare? Button struggled with the McLaren and was edged out by Hamilton who managed a respectable 4th on the grid. Button found himself lucky to squeeze into Q3 and finished 4 tenths behind his team mate with 8th place for the start of tomorrow’s race. Button said, "It was getting better every run but I did struggle with front locking this afternoon. Something felt wrong through qualifying so we are going to have a look at that."
Hamilton had his problems too, after a cooling duct issue in the morning practice, which limited his running time, he still managed to hold it together for a second row start. This was an important factor as previous winners of this race have only ever started in the top 4 positions.
The hype was all about how would 7 time world champion Schumacher perform on his return to F1 after a three year break from the sport. As a very proud man, 7th place on the grid was surely not the result he would have been hoping for, especially considering his compatriot and team-mate was 2 places higher up the grid than him. Schumi was not looking very comfortable with his car, tentative by his previous standards. Rosberg was 0.5 seconds quicker than Schumi and on that he said, “That is a bit too much for my standards. I've got to raise my game a bit and I'm sure I'm able to. "I certainly feel a little bit rusty, certainly on the one-lap issue I can do better.”
However, the old Schumi we all loved to hate was out in force after qualifying was over. In parc ferme he was checking out his competition and having a sneaky look at the McLaren car. Not much has changed there then!
Polish star Kubica was one of the stars of qualifying, managing to make it into the top 10 shoot out with his yellow and black Renault. Force India’s Adrian Sutil rounded out the top ten and showed that the performances in the tail end of 2009 are likely to be repeated again this year, with chances to fight for good points. No more running at the back of the grid for the Dr Vijay Mallya’s team.
Brazilian Rubens Barrichello may be the man to watch tomorrow as he starts 11th on the grid but is the first runner not to be starting with the soft tyres. He will have an advantage that he will have the fresh tyres for the first stint so could be a sneaky tIp for a good points score. When asked if what he thought about his ex-team-mate Schumi being ahead of him on the grid, Barrichello laughed and said “I have new tyres” with a smile, so he clearly feels he can cause some trouble amongst the front runners.
It was not all about the fight at the front of course. Three new teams took part in this qualifying in the super hot conditions of Bahrain. Who won the battle of best newcomers? Virgin Racing took that award with Timo Glock in 19th and Lucas di Grassi in 22nd. This was a particularly rewarding result after the problems they were suffering with a tyre flying off in an earlier practice. It was lovely to hear the famous “Senna” name back in with F1 too with Aytron Senna’s nephew taking his place with the Hispania Racing Team qualifying 23rd.
One of the most astonishing stories of the day must belong to India’s Karun Chandhok. He entered qualifying without even turning a single lap of the Bahrain track. Due to technical difficulties, he was forced to be incredibly patient and hope he would get a chance to appear on track. The FIA agreed that as long as he could make it at least into the pitlane during qualifying, he could take part in the race tomorrow. He did that and completed seven laps of the circuit and finished 1.7 seconds off his team-mate. It was certainly not the easiest debut on track for the seemingly calm 26 year old. Afterwards he said, “"I didn't want to get in anyone's way and got a lot of pickup on the tyres trying to keep out of the way. We're not here to upset anyone; we're just here to be respectable and do the best job that we can."
Results of Qualifying for the Bahrain Race, Round 1.
1. Sebastian Vettel Germany Red Bull-Renault 1m 54.101s
2. Felipe Massa Brazil Ferrari-Ferrari 1m 54.242s
3. Fernando Alonso Spain Ferrari-Ferrari 1m 54.608s
4. Lewis Hamilton Britain McLaren-Mercedes 1m 55.217s
5. Nico Rosberg Germany Mercedes-Mercedes 1m 55.241s
6. Mark Webber Australia Red Bull-Renault 1m 55.284s
7. Michael Schumacher Germany Mercedes-Mercedes 1m 55.524s
8. Jenson Button Britain McLaren-Mercedes 1m 55.672s
9. Robert Kubica Poland Renault-Renault 1m 55.885s
10. Adrian Sutil Germany Force India-Mercedes 1m 56.309s
11. Rubens Barrichello Brazil Williams-Cosworth 1m 55.330s
12. Vitantonio Liuzzi Italy Force India-Mercedes 1m 55.653s
13. Nico Hulkenberg Germany Williams-Cosworth 1m 55.857s
14. Pedro de la Rosa Spain BMW Sauber-Ferrari 1m 56.237s
15. Sebastien Buemi Switzerland Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m 56.265s
16. Kamui Kobayashi Japan BMW Sauber-Ferrari 1m 56.270s
17. Vitaly Petrov Russia Renault-Renault 1m 56.619s
18. Jaime Alguersuari Spain Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m 57.071s
19. Timo Glock Germany Virgin-Cosworth 1m 59.728s
20. Jarno Trulli Italy Lotus-Cosworth 1m 59.852s
21. Heikki Kovalainen Finland Lotus-Cosworth 2m 00.313s
22. Lucas di Grassi Brazil Virgin-Cosworth 2m 00.587s
23. Bruno Senna Brazil HRT-Cosworth 2m 03.240s
24. Karun Chandhok India HRT-Cosworth 2m 04.904s
How did the team-mates fare?
Hamilton 1-0 Button, Massa 1-0 Alonso, Vettel 1-0 Webber, Rosberg 1-0 Schumacher, Kubica 1-0 Petrov, Barrichello 1 -0 Hulkenberg, Sutil 1 –0 Liuzzi, De La Rosa 1-0 Kobayashi, Buemi 1-0 Alguersuari, Glock 1-0 Di Grassi, Trulli 1-0 Kovalainen, Senna 1 – 0 Chandhok.
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