Hello fellow Formula 1 fanatics, here is the post-qualifying edition of Newsbites at the Japanese Grand Prix. Let’s get straight into the latest news from the paddock.

 

 

Hamilton clinches 80th pole at rain-effected Suzuka, Vettel ninth

 

Lewis Hamilton took pole position for tomorrow’s 53-lap Japanese Grand Prix, while title-rival Sebastian Vettel qualified in ninth place after a gamble on intermediate tyres went wrong.

 

Hamilton hit the ground running on his flying lap in Q3 with the red-branded supersoft rubber, posting the benchmark of a 1:27.760, which was 0.229 seconds quicker than Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas.

 

That lap time was quick enough to secure pole before the rain once again kicked in at the Suzuka International Racing Course.

 

Both Mercedes will start on the yellow-marked soft tyres, which they set their times with in Q2.

 

The two Ferrari’s of Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen were sent out on the intermediates at the beginning of Q3 with the anticipation of the rain arriving earlier.

 

Both SF71-H racers were forced to abandon their first timed runs to put on a set of slick rubber, meaning their initial hot laps came just before the rain was about to fall and while Raikkonen made it just in time to set a 1:29.521 to go fourth fastest behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, Vettel’s rear stepped out and the German ran off at Spoon Curve, posting a 1:32.192 and only good enough for ninth place.

 

Afterwards as the rain intensified, Vettel went off through the gravel trap at Degner 2 while tip-toeing on slicks.

 

This allowed Haas F1 Team’s Romain Grosjean to start fifth on the grid, with the Frenchman the only driver in the midfield group in the top 10 starting on the soft compounds after posting an impressive time on the yellow-marked rubber in Q2.

 

His Q3 time was two tenths quicker than Toro Rosso’s Brendon Hartley who will start sixth.

 

At Honda’s home Grand Prix, Toro Rosso targeted having both STR13’s making Q3 with the latest “Spec 3” engine for qualifying in it’s first outing as Hartley ended the session ahead of team-mate Pierre Gasly who was seventh.

 

Racing Point Force India pairing Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez qualified in eighth and tenth respectively with the aforementioned Vettel splitting the two Mercedes-powered cars.

 

Perez did not post a serious hot lap, with the Mexican lapping 9.5 seconds off Hamilton’s benchmark after abandoning his first timed-run.

 

Sauber’s Charles Leclerc will start from 11th place, with the Monegasque driver the quickest of those eliminated in Q2 meaning the initial-timed hot laps decided the order.

 

Leclerc was 11th after his first flyer, but attempted to complete another lap on a second set of supersofts in the hope of cracking into the top ten before spinning upon the exit of Degner 1.

 

The other Haas of Kevin Magnussen will start the race in 12th having run the soft compounds on his first timed-run and was more than half a second slower than team-mate Grosjean in Q2 using the same tyres.

 

Carlos Sainz qualified 13th for Renault and ahead of Williams Martini Racing’s Lance Stroll who was 14th.

 

Red Bull Racing’s Daniel Ricciardo was the biggest casualty to bow out of Q2 after travelling slowly to the pits at the end of his out-lap with an engine problem.

 

The other Renault RS-18 of Nico Hulkenberg was eliminated in Q1 after his first run was jeopardized by the red flag caused by Sauber’s Marcus Ericsson crashing at turn seven.

 

The Swedish driver ran onto the grass through the left-hander and spun into the barrier on his second flyer, bringing the red flag out for six minutes.

 

Hulkenberg was, along with Renault team-mate Sainz and Perez, one of three drivers not to have posted a time at that point of the session, and after rushing out at the restart, the German fell back into the danger zone due to a big amount of improvements as Q1 ended.

 

Sainz’ was the one who knocked Hulkenberg into the bottom five with his improved timed-run and the latter was 0.044 seconds slower than Stroll.

 

The other Williams of Sergey Sirotkin qualified 17th and ahead of the two Renault-powered McLaren MCL33’s of Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne who were 18th and 19th respectively.

 

The aforementioned Ericsson finished at the rear.

 

Formula 1 2018 Honda Japanese Grand Prix Qualifying Results Classification

 

POSITION	DRIVER	CAR	TIME	GAP
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport	1m27.760s	–
2	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport	1m28.059s	0.299s
3	Max Verstappen	Aston Martin Red Bull Racing	1m29.057s	1.297s
4	Kimi Raikkonen	Scuderia Ferrari	1m29.521s	1.761s
5	Romain Grosjean	Haas F1 Team	1m29.761s	2.001s
6	Brendon Hartley	Scuderia Toro Rosso-Honda	1m30.023s	2.263s
7	Pierre Gasly	Scuderia Toro Rosso-Honda	1m30.093s	2.333s
8	Esteban Ocon	Racing Point Force India F1 Team	1m30.126s	2.366s
9	Sebastian Vettel	Scuderia Ferrari	1m32.192s	4.432s
10	Sergio Perez	Racing Point Force India F1 Team	1m37.229s	9.469s
11	Charles Leclerc	Alfa Romeo Sauber F1 Team	1m29.864s	2.104s
12	Kevin Magnussen	Haas F1 Team	1m30.226s	2.466s
13	Carlos Sainz	Renault Sport F1 Team	1m30.490s	2.730s
14	Lance Stroll	Williams Martini Racing	1m30.714s	2.954s
15	Daniel Ricciardo	Aston Martin Red Bull Racing	–	–
16	Nico Hulkenberg	Renault Sport F1 Team	1m30.361s	2.601s
17	Sergey Sirotkin	Williams Martini Racing	1m30.372s	2.612s
18	Fernando Alonso	McLaren-Renault F1 Team	1m30.573s	2.813s
19	Stoffel Vandoorne	McLaren-Renault F1 Team	1m31.041s	3.281s
20	Marcus Ericsson	Alfa Romeo Sauber F1 Team	1m31.213s	3.453s

 

Hamilton hails Mercedes strategy call

 

 

Lewis Hamilton hailed his Mercedes team as “the best in the world” after taking pole position for tomorrow’s Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka.

 

The Suzuka International Racing Course was hit changeable conditions heading into the top-ten shootout, and appearing to have worsened, but Mercedes made the decision to send their drivers out on the supersoft rubber whilst rivals Ferrari took a gamble on the intermediates expecting a sudden downpour.

 

The circuit however, remained dry during the early stages of Q3 and allowed Hamilton and team-mate Valtteri Bottas to push the limit of their W09 EQ Power+ machines, with the former posting a 1:27.960 to secure the 80th pole position of his Formula 1 career.

 

Ferrari, on the other hand, could only settle for fourth and ninth after being forced back to the pits to change for supersofts.

 

“The team have done an amazing job this weekend,” explained Hamilton after qualifying. “The call we made to go out in Q3 – which is probably the most difficult call, you saw all of us fumbling and trying to figure out what to do – the team were spot on with it and it gave us an opportunity to grab this pole position.”

 

“While it was a bit of an anti-climax, because we didn’t get to do the last lap – it’s my 80th, I can’t believe I have 80. I couldn’t have done this without the team. We worked so hard on this car to refine it, improve it in all areas – and even in ourselves and how we function, the processes we go through, our communication, everything.”

 

“It’s really such an honour to race for this team, for the guys – and I’m just so thankful. A big thank you to everyone back at the factory. I’m so proud to be on this journey with them. Never in a million years did I think I’d get to 80.” Hamilton said.

 

With Vettel’s title hopes continuing to falter, Hamilton reaffirmed his belief that his Silver Arrows have the upper hand over the Scuderia this season when making the calls for the right strategy.

 

“Look it’s so difficult out there to make the right call. But I think that’s another big difference that we as a team have made this year,” Hamilton continued. “Every team has smart people, but ultimately when it comes to being under pressure, making the right decisions, the right calls – that’s why we’re the best team in the world. And rightly so, they deserve that.” Hamilton concluded.

 

 

Vettel confident for race despite dismal qualifying

 

Sebastian Vettel’s title hopes took another blow as he qualified ninth for tomorrow’s Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka as he attempts to try and overturn a 50-point deficit to Championship leader Lewis Hamilton. The German despite his setback, believes he has the pace to make his way through the field.

 

With light drizzle happening on and off during qualifying, Ferrari decided to send Vettel and team-mate Kimi Raikkonen out on intermediates at the beginning of Q3. It proved to be the wrong call, with no standing water on track to justify the grooved compound.

 

Both drivers had plenty of time to switch their inters for supersofts that Mercedes sent Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas out with. But Raikkonen managed to post the fourth fastest time despite conditions deteriorating. Vettel however, made an error at Spoon corner on his first flying lap, before worsening weather wiped out the German’s chances of improving.

 

That saw Vettel finished in ninth place, although he will be promoted to eighth for tomorrow’s race after Force India’s Esteban Ocon received a three-place grid penalty for failing to slow under red flag conditions in Free Practice Three.

 

“I think the first run was sort of okay,” explained Vettel after qualifying. “I had a mistake in Spoon so lost most of the time there. But obviously the second run we didn’t make it out on time because the rain came so we were too late.”

 

Vettel on whether he can still climb through the field despite Suzuka being a hard place to overtake on.

 

“Of course,” Vettel continued. “It’s not the position we deserve to be in. I think we had better speed than ninth but we start there and then see how it goes. Anything could happen tomorrow, tomorrow’s a new day. Obviously it’s not easy when you start further back but it’s not impossible.”

 

Ricciardo: “I just can’t catch a break”

 

 

After being eliminated from Q2, and his RB14 racer limping back to the pits with an engine problem, Daniel Ricciardo’s scream echoed throughout the pit-lane and the Australian’s recent record stands at five failures to take part in Q3 at the last seven races.

 

Ricciardo was lost for words at the post-qualifying press commitments.

 

“I just blew out my vocals. I’m pissed,” Ricciardo said. “I felt a loss of power out of the last corner, just before I started the lap. I knew it was something – and it seems terminal. I just can’t catch a break.”

 

Should it be a terminal power unit issue, the Australian would be relegated from 15th to the back row of the grid, having already used up his allowed amount of Renault engines for the season.

 

Ricciardo who has not been on the podium since Monaco ten races ago, was not confident ahead of tomorrow’s 53-lap Japanese Grand Prix with recovering as much places as possible due to Suzuka being a hard place to make up places on, despite being one of the best overtakers in the field.

 

“Hopefully. We’ll see,” Ricciardo continued, when asked if luck will turn around for him tomorrow. “Qualifying is important here, like always. It’s hard to follow but I’ll try to do what I can. But yeah, I don’t know… it’s pretty painful at the moment.”

 

 

F1 teams meet to ‘improve the spectacle’

 

Formula 1’s team bosses have met in Suzuka to discuss how to improve the spectacle of the sport.

 

The meeting was an informal gathering with no specific gender or any of the FIA or Liberty/F1 in attendance, compared to the Strategy Group where future ideas are normally discussed and debated.

 

It was the first time that the teams met without Formula 1’s key stakeholders as also the political development over the direction and future of the sport in 2021 and beyond continues to build.

 

The teams are hoping to build an alliance on they major key issues for Formula 1.

 

“It was just to talk about the state of F1 and how we’re going to improve it going forward,” explained Force India team principal Otmar Szafnauer. “The racing’s got a lot better but it could be better.”

 

“So for example if we have a two pitstop race it might be better, or a combination of some doing one and some doing two. So how do we get there? It was all about improving the show.”

 

“The Strategy Group has a specific agenda, and you stick to the agenda. But today it was talk about anything. I thought it was a good idea and maybe we’d come up with some suggestions, but I didn’t hear anything different from whatever was said before – two stops better than one stop, how are we going to make that happen?”

 

“There are different opinions, but the one thing we all agree on is if we can split strategies, that will be good. Because everyone tends to the same strategy now. But at the beginning [with Pirelli] it wasn’t like that, if you remember.”

 

Szafnauer said talks were positive even if there were dead-end conclusions.

 

“We came out thinking that it was good to get together and mull this stuff over, to see what idea that we have, and once we’re aligned we can talk to FOM too. It was just getting our thoughts together.”

 

“I think whether we were aligned or have differences, it’s just good to feed that back to the FIA. Sometimes not all of us do. It’s good to make good decisions with a lot of information. The more information you have, the better outcome that you’re going to have in your decision making.”

 

Szafnauer believes the teams should continue to get together and discuss these issues more often.

 

“It doesn’t happen that often,” Szafnauer continued. “I think it’s just good to sit down and chat. I think the last one we had was in Malaysia [2017].”

 

“I think we should continue to do it, meet once a month, as opposed to just ad hoc, and let everyone vent their opinions.”

 

“There are different teams out there, we different from the big ones, and there are other ones that are different from us, and everyone’s got their own opinion. And in some things, like a better product, we should all be aligned. We should all want a better product.” Szafnauer concluded.

 

 

Hakkinen re-unites with an old friend

 

Mika Hakkinen re-united with his 1998 Championship winning McLaren-Mercedes MP4/13 at Suzuka yesterday, where he won the title 20 years ago at the same venue.

 

The Finn was invited by Suzuka Circuit to take part in a gathering of historic Formula 1 machinery to celebrate the 30th running of the Japanese Grand Prix.

 

Although he has driven the MP4/13 numerous times later in his McLaren career for demonstration runs, it was the first time the Finn had driven the car since retiring from racing.

 

He completed a short run yesterday, today and will have one last run tomorrow in a parade run.

 

Hakkinen had one minor problem yesterday, due to the pit entrance having changed since his last visit at the Hugenholtz-designed track.

 

“You can imagine what it was like, particular on this race track,” Hakkinen explained to Autosport. “It’s a fabulous race track, so many unbelievable memories, winning a world championship here against Michael Schumacher.”

 

“Of course it feels like yesterday, it’s logical, because it’s such a strong memory.”

 

Hakkinen admitted that after so many years away from the sport, the speed of a Formula 1 car – even one from 20 years ago came as a bit of a shock.

 

“The G-forces are so heavy, and you cannot compare it with a road car,” Hakkinen continued. “What is amazing is that of course the car is so quick, all the common sense that you are thinking, is how is it possible that the cars can have such high performance?”

 

“I feel that the engineers of the McLaren team, when they built that car for me, did a brilliant team work.” Hakkinen concluded.