Torrential rain pounded down on the Marina Bay Circuiton Saturday evening but it could not dampen the euphoria of the Formula One fans who had witnessed the best qualifying session of the season for Sunday’s Singapore Grand Prix.
Lewis Hamilton, whose almost Ayrton Senna-like one-lap lustre has been seen only intermittently this year, produced the final, vivid flourish to a breathtaking contest that starred not only the Silver Arrows but also the Red Bulls and Ferraris. It was another Mercedes lock-out – and it should not be forgotten that this bumpy, multi-cornered circuit is like no other – but the other teams really are catching up, even if it is too late to make any difference this year.
Nico Rosberg’s exclamation of “Damn it!” when he discovered he had been beaten by just 0.007sec – or 33.5cm if you prefer – was proof enough of how close it really was. “007 is cool,” Hamilton remarked.
Hamilton’s sixth pole of the season, and his third here, came after he had made a potentially costly mistake, locking up at turn one. But he still found enough in his car and himself to edge past his Mercedes team-mate Rosberg, who himself had just stolen provisional pole from Daniel Ricciardo. Behind that trio on Sunday’s grid will be Sebastian Vettel, Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa.
Hamilton, whose driving looked scrappy in the earlier practice session, said: “I knew I had the pace, but it was just about putting the sectors together, which is not easy. It’s the most incredible feeling on the last lap, with all the pressure, when the smallest mistake could lose you a lot. After the first sequence of corners I was already two-tenths down but I said to myself: ‘Let’s keep going and see what happens.’
“The previous lap wasn’t perfect either, I lost time in 13 and 16, but I fixed that and got the time back and the last sector was pretty hardcore fast.”
Hamilton has won six times already this season but needs to do so again to make a significant dent in Rosberg’s 22-point advantage: there are just six races remaining. He won here in 2009 but has not finished in the top four in the past four years. Four times in the past six years the Singapore Grand Prix has been won by the pole-sitter.
The British driver added: “The others have taken a step, it is a real, real surprise. I’m just as surprised to see Ferrari competing on a lap, which is great to see, also Williams and Red Bull. For racing it’s great. That is the most exciting qualifying session I have had for a long time. You have to be spot-on and I was almost there.”
Rosberg blamed a change of brake specification for not being at his absolute best – he also locked up in Q1 and went down an escape road, a piece of maladroitness reminiscent of his mistakes in Monza. “We changed brakes going into qualifying and I got into a rhythm with the other brakes, so that was a challenge,” he said. “It took me some time to get into qualifying, and the balance difference as the track had cooled down. I had to completely adapt to the setting and it took me some time to get into the car.”
Q1 had been dominated by Ferrari, who looked stronger than at any time this year. It was the usually under-performing Kimi Raik
In Q2, Button missed out on making the final, top-10 shootout by just 0.017sec. Romain Grosjean, another casualty, sounded rather angry. “I cannot believe it, bloody engine, bloody engine,” the Lotus driver said over the team radio. His race engineer replied: “Understand Romain, I’m very sorry it’s the same issue as we had in P3.” Grosjean came back: “I don’t care, I don’t care, it’s too much.”
Rosberg finished fastest in Q2, by almost half a second, but only after going out for an extra run while Hamilton and the Ferrari drivers rested in their garages.
Alonso is not planning any further relaxation on Sunday. “I will do a good start and will overtake two or three cars,” he joked. If one man is capable of doing that it is the Spaniard. But Hamilton is the favourite to win and intensify the pressure on an already rattled-looking Rosberg.
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