After the season-opener in Melbourne, the F1 fraternity heads to Malaysia for the second of the flyaway races.
Kuala Lumpur is infamous for its hot and humid climate, making it one of the toughest races on the calendar. Drivers can lose up to 4 kg of fluid during the race, posing a serious threat of dehydration.
ALONSO RETURNS AMID MYSTERY
However, the talking point coming into the Malaysian GP wasn’t the gruelling conditions, but the return of a certain two-time world champion. After missing the Australian GP due to concussions suffered in a pre-season testing crash, Fernando Alonso is back in the paddock this week in his McLaren-Honda overalls.
During the drivers press conference on Thursday, the Spaniard insisted that a steering issue was to be blamed for his crash that required him to spend three successive days in the hospital. However, he said that McLaren - who earlier stated that a gust of wind was the real cause of the crash - couldn’t find anything such while analysing the data from the car.
While some questions still remain unanswered as to the exact circumstances of the incident, it’s clear that he is likely to languish at the back of the grid, come race day.
McLaren continues to run an underpowered Honda engine on the back of the MP4-30 until the Japanese manufacturer sorts out the issues that plagued its pre-season testing programme. As a result, Fernando Alonso was only 16th quickest in FP2, with teammate Jenson Button a tenth adrift in 17th place.
Excluding Romain Grosjean’s Lotus who suffered from loss of power, McLaren only managed to beat the Manor pairing of Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi who are competing in a year old car.
SILVER RUSH AT SEPANG
At the front, Lewis Hamilton led the time-sheets for Mercedes despite a troubled day at the Sepang International Circuit. The British driver stopped on track during the first 30 mins of FP1 with engine issues, having not set a single timed lap by then. He returned in the W06 Hybrid in the afternoon and surged to the top of the time-sheets with 20 minutes to go with a laptime of 1:39.790.
Nico Rosberg couldn’t accompany his teammate after failing to get even half-a-decent lap on the faster medium tyres. In fact, his time in FP2 was slower than what he managed on the white-striped hard tyre in the morning.
As a result, Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen managed to find a place between the two Mercedes pairing in second with a lap time of 1:40.063.
Sebastian Vettel ruined what could have been his quickest lap with a spin at turn 11. He recovered from the incident and ended the day in 7th place in the final classifications
Like the above two teams, Red Bull had a mixed day at the office with Daniil Kvyat completing 17 laps in FP2 en route to the fourth fastest time of the day while Ricciardo was just limited to 8 laps in the afternoon.
RED BULL AND RENAULT BICKER
Red Bull have been critical of engine partners Renault after their disappointing finish in Australia, prompting the French manufacturer to fire back. Renault Sport F1 chief Cyril Abiteboul said the data from the car proves that Ricciardo’s mediocre 7th place finish was equally down to chassis and engine. He further added that Red Bull had forced
Away from this battle of words, Williams - who seem to enjoy a much healthier relationship with their engine partners Mercedes - were fifth and sixth quickest with returnee Valtteri Bottas leading the charge for the Grove based outfit. Expect the team to make inroads overnight and challenge Ferrari to be the second fastest team.
Meanwhile, the two Toro Rosso rookies were 9th and 13th quickest respectively while the Sauber pairing finished the session in 9th and 12th places respectively.
During the two week break, Sauber settled its legal wrangle with former test driver Giedo van der Garde, with the Dutchman being handed a significant compensation.
The Force Indias of Sergio Perez of Nico Hulkenberg who were content with a double point finish in Melbourne, considering the delays to their 2015 car, were classified 13th and 15th quickest in today’s session.
Reliability would be a key factor in the Sepang heat as the cars would be pushed to the limit. The axing of the German Grand Prix, however, is a blessing in disguise for the 10 teams as it would mean they have to stretch their engines for one less race. For the fans though, it’s another big hit.
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