Formula 1 Championship leader Lewis Hamilton will start the first ever F1 Russian Grand Prix from pole position after beating Mercedes AMG F1 teammate Nico Rosberg and Williams’ Valtteri Bottas in today’s qualifying session at the Sochi Autodrom.
It was an unusual session with tyres holding for a number of flying laps. Some drivers pushed their tyres too hard early on and paid the price with their rears seemingly giving little grip at the end of the session. Others had just enough life in their tyres to make improvements in their final flyings laps which proved instrumental in deciding the provisional order on the grid.
In the end, a 1:38.513 by 2008 F1 champion Hamilton proved to be enough for pole position with Nico Rosberg getting within two tenths of a second to qualify on the front row.
Williams looked set to upset Mercedes party in qualifying after Valtteri Bottas went purple in first two sectors around the 5.8km Sochi Autodrom. However, on the very final corner, Bottas went too deep into the asphalt run off and had to settle for third place.
After the FP3 wobble, the McLaren F1 team was back on their Friday form with Jenson Button putting his MP4-29 in fourth place on the grid - his best qualifying result since this year’s F1 British Grand Prix. A late surge by Magnussen saw him take sixth in qualifying, despite missing much of the final practice session. A five place grid penalty for a change of gearbox, however, will drop the Dane outside of top 10.
Daniil Kvyat’s stonking form in his home Grand Prix continued in qualifying with the Russian qualifying his Toro Rosso in a career best fifth place. Jean Eric Vergne also managed to make it into Q3 but could qualify no higher than 10th.
It was a poor session for Red Bull’s flagship outfit who got outqualified by their juniour team, reminiscent of the 2008 F1 season. Daniel Ricciardo was seventh quickest in Q3 while four-time defending F1 champion Sebastian Vettel even failed to make it into the top 10 shootout.
Ferraris struggled on what is sought to be a power track with former F1 champions Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen only eighth and ninth quickest respectively in qualifying.
With Toro Rossos showing strong form all weekend, Force India had little hope of starting the first ever Russian Grand Prix from the top 10, as today’s qualifying session showed. Nico Hulkenberg was only 12th quickest and will drop five places for a gearbox change while Sergio Perez posted a laptime that was within a tenth of his German teammate to take 13th.
Esteban Gutierrez outqualified his Sauber teammate Adrian Sutil to take a provisional 14th on the grid while Romain Grosjean made it into Q2 for the third consecutive race at the expense of Lotus teammate Pastor Maldonado and the Williams of Felipe Massa who was hindered by power issues.
Marcus Ericsson qualified a career best 17th as Caterham continued to have an upper hand over Marussia for the second race running.
F1 RUSSIAN GRAND PRIX QUALIFYING - TOP 10
1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:38.513
2 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:38.713 +0.200
3 Valtteri Bottas Williams 1:38.920 +0.407
4 Jenson Button McLaren 1:39.121 +0.608
5 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:39.277 +0.764
6 Kevin Magnussen McLaren 1:39.629 +1.116
7 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull 1:39.635 +1.122
8 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:39.709 +1.196
9 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1:39.771 +1.258
10 Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso 1:40.020 +1.507
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