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Malaysian GP Qualifying
3/4/10
Despite a torrential down pour during qualifying at Sepang in Malaysia, Red Bull's Mark Webber came out on top to take pole, closely followed by Mercedes Nico Rosberg, and Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel in third with 1m 50.789s. Adrian Sutil finished a strong fourth for Force India on full wets with a 1m 50.914s.
Both Ferraris and McLarens were eliminated during Q1. Lotus Racing, one of three new teams, went on to achieve the unexpected. Their smiling faces beamed through the rain sodden Sepang track as another important milestone was achieved, with Heikki Kovalainen going into his first Q2 with the team. Finishing 15th (1.52.270) it was obvious that their clever strategy of taking advantage of the heavy rain that had started falling just before the session began, paid off. Unfortunately, the same couldn't be said of his team mate Jarno Trulli, who finished 18th, (1.52.884) narrowly missing out on Q2.
Heikki Kovalainen said, “I’m so pleased! I really like these conditions – it’s very hard to judge your speed and you really have to take some risks, and all the time you’re feeling like you might lose the car, but that’s the challenge and I love it! On some parts of the track it was very wet and raining hard, and on others it wasn’t so much. Getting to Q2 really exceeds expectations for me and the whole team – yes of course we’ve been a little bit lucky today for sure, but it means we beat the other new teams, again! Although we were lucky, we played our strategy just right - if you look at the McLarens and Ferraris they didn’t think it was going to rain that much and look what happened. They missed their window at the beginning of the session and we took full advantage of it. Now I can’t wait to race tomorrow!”
Vettel said, "a chaotic session, but with so many quick runners down the back, and the prospect of rain at some stage on Sunday, an exciting Grand Prix is highly likely."
