photo credit: Flickr/Thomas Davey

Q1: Narain Karthikeyan and Pedro de la Rosa both failed to qualifying with the 107% rule. As far as I’m concerned, they don’t belong on the grid, but I’m not Charlie Whiting.

Kimi Raikkonen did not make it out of Q1. He was timed to cross the line for a hot lap just as the clock hit zero, but a slight off meant no such luck. Both Catherham and Marussia cars did not make it either.

Several drivers set fast laps, including ones you would not expect: both Williams were on top, Jean-Eric Vergne in his Toro Rosso (second fastest time in the end), and Kamui Kobayashi in the Sauber in the end. Felipe Massa barely made it out of the session.

Knocked out, P18-22: Kimi Raikkonen, Lotus; Heikki Kovalainen, Caterham; Vitaly Petrov, Caterham; Timo Glock, Marussia; Charles Pic, Marussia

Q2: The McLaren cars quickly took the top two spots in the second session.

Fernando Alonso beached his car in the gravel after putting a wheel in the grass…causing a red flag with just under 8 1/2 minutes left.

Once time got started again, the two Mercedes took the top spots.

Both Ferraris were knocked out.

Knocked out, P11-17: Jean-Eric Vergne, Toro Rosso; Fernando Alonso, Ferrari; Kamui Kobayashi, Sauber; Bruno Senna, Williams; Paul di Resta, Force India; Felipe Massa, Ferrari; Sergio Perez, Sauber.

Q3: No idea how I am supposed to sleep after this one. What looked to be a set 1-2 for McLaren first looked like it wasn’t going to happen, as Schumacher and Grosjean both took P2. But in the end, McLaren held it.

1. Lewis Hamilton, McLaren: 1:24.922
2. Jenson Button, McLaren: 1:25.074
3. Romain Grosjean, Lotus: 1:25.302
4. Michael Schumacher, Mercedes: 1:25.336
5. Mark Webber, Red Bull: 1:25.651
6. Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull: 1:25.668
7. Nico Rosberg, Mercedes: 1:25.688
8. Pastor Maldonado, Williams: 1:25.908
9. Nico Hulkenberg, Force India: 1:26.451
10. Daniel Ricciardo, Toro Rosso: no Q3 time set » Continue reading “Qualifying Recap: McLaren 1-2 For First Race Of The Season”

Both Sebastian Vettel and Michael Schumacher lost control of their cars and slid deep into the gravel during the last 15 minutes of the final practice session before qualifying in two hours.

Lewis Hamilton took fastest lap from Romain Grosjean with just minutes left. At 1:25.681, Hamilton narrowly beat Grosjean’s time by .077 seconds.

Mark Webber was third fastest, with Jenson Button fourth. Rosberg and Schumacher finished fifth and sixth. Vettel still finished seventh.

Grosjean’s teammate, Kimi Raikkonen, only managed 12th spot.

Pedro de la Rosa continued to have no such luck, so it’ll be interesting to see how the 107% rule plays out during qualifying.

Additionally something to watch over the next few hours: Red Bull and Lotus have asked the FIA to reconsider Mercedes’ rear wing as legal. A formal protest could be lodged after qualifying if Charlie Whiting stays firm on the wing being legal.

Interestingly enough, both teams run Renault engines, and the fastest cars so far have been Mercedes powered.

photo credit: Flickr/Jose Mª Izquierdo Galiot

2004 called, and Michael Schumacher was fastest overall in Friday’s afternoon practice session.

It of course rained between the first and second sessions. Some drivers went out while it was wet, on wet tires, but once again it came down to the last 30 minutes.

Mercedes powered teams made a strong showing, first with both Force India drivers. Nico Hulkenberg had the second fastest time overall, and while Paul di Resta was on top at one point, he finished sixth.

Sergio Perez and Kamui Kobayashi also had a strong showing, despite the fact both almost pushed it too far in the wet. Kobayashi had an amazing save when he started to lose control around the final corner as time ran out. Perez was third fastest, and Kobayashi fifth fastest.

The two were separated by Fernando Alonso. Felipe Massa managed seventh overall, and also managed to not spin out.

Heikki Kovalainen, besides becoming an Angry Grassmowing Bird at one point, finished a surprising eighth overall, outpacing the Red Bull drivers.

Pedro de la Rosa was able to complete one whole lap!

Other things that have happened:

- The FIA is looking to get rid of the ugly noses on the cars next season. The rules in 2014 would actually kill them off, but apparently we are all a bunch of people with fine aesthetic taste and they want to please us.

- Teams want the FIA to police the RRA, or Resource Restriction Agreement. Actually, all teams except Red Bull and Toro Rosso signed the letter; previously Christian Horner has said he doesn’t think the RRA is the way to control costs. The letter asks the FIA to make teams follow the agreement through the sporting regulations.

- Pedro de la Rosa is confirmed as the GPDA (Grand Prix Drivers Association, acronyms are so fun at 9am on a Friday) chairman. Rubens Barrichello was previously chair. Sebastian Vettel and Felipe Massa will continue to hold their roles as directors.

photo credit: Flickr/Pau Pitarch

During the first practice session, McLaren ruled the field with a 1-2 finish.

Meanwhile, Felipe Massa finished with a trip to the gravel after he touched the grass.

The grass was wet. Surprise!

The session started off a bit damp, but teams finally started to head out on intermediates as the track dried out. Finally with about 30 minutes left, teams started switching to slicks and times were set.

Mercedes looked to be fastest of all thanks to the rear wing design, but McLaren ended up on top. Jenson Button was the fastest of the two, with Lewis Hamilton just .245 seconds behind. Michael Schumacher was third fastest, with Nico Rosberg ending up down in sixth in the end.

Fernando Alonso was fourth fastest, .8 seconds off Button’s pace…and far quicker than teammate Massa’s 18th fastest time.

Mark Webber was fifth quickest, with reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel only pulling off the 11th fastest time of the morning.

Things did not go very well for HRT, with both Narain Karthikeyan and Pedro de la Rossa unable to set any time. Karthikeyan tried, completing 3 laps overall, but the engine overheated on him out on track.

Full times and results here.

photo credit: Wikimedia Commons/Andreas Praefcke

Yesterday, Sebastian Vettel was awarded the highest sporting honor in Germany, as he received the Silberne Lorbeerblatt, or Silver Bay Laurel Leaf.

The award is presented to athletes or teams of “exemplary character” who have won some sort of championship. Obviously, a character like Vettel with his two world championships more than qualifies.

The ceremony took place in Berlin, with acting president Horst Seehofer presenting the award to Vettel.

Vettel called it quite an honor, since it is not something you are awarded possibly more than once in a lifetime.

Vettel’s fellow German Michael Schumacher won the award in 1995.

photo credit: Flickr/Gil Abrantes

Lotus had their first and last day of testing this week, pulling out due to a critical error with their chassis. This was the first running of the second E20 chassis, and the team plans to take the time to find what exactly has gone wrong.

The team says the problem applies to both cars, which will have to be modified. The team did not name what exactly the problem is, but said the first chassis looked to have the problems after tests were run at it back in Enstone.

Romain Grosjean was able to complete seven laps before Lotus called it a week. Grosjean said the car felt strange to drive before the team abandoned the test.

Sebastian Vettel topped the timesheets for the day, first taking the top time from Nico Hulkenberg before going even quicker later in the day. Vettel’s fastest lap was a 1:23.265 out of the 79 laps he completed.

Many teams went with long runs. Charles Pic completed 121 laps for Marussia, but was the slowest of the 11 cars present at the test.

Heikki Kovalainen had a rough day in the Caterham. After nine laps, a broken rod left him stranded out on track. He was able to return in the afternoon to complete an overall 31 laps.

Lewis Hamilton was third fastest for the day, completing 114 laps in the McLaren.

The new Mercedes was sixth for the day, with Michael Schumacher at the wheel for 51 laps total.

(photo credit: flickr/Code Rodefeld)

Michael Schumacher may have had the fastest time at the second day of testing in Jerez with a lap time of 1:18.561.

But once again, he’s in last year’s Mercedes just testing out the new tires. Nobody cares. Or apparently people do care, but once again I stress: it’s pre-season testing and it’s not even the car he’ll be driving come Australia.

Of the new, shiny, ugly 2012 cars, Mark Webber and the Red Bull RB8 were quickest. Webber’s fastest lap was 1:19.184. Webber ran 58 laps in the car.

Daniel Ricciardo in the Toro Rosso was the only other car to manage a lap under 80 seconds.

Pastor Maldonado was able to complete twice as many laps today for Williams.

BONUS: nobody has crashed so far! However, it was not a good day for Kimi.

Raikkonen went off into the gravel and damaged the car crossing back over the curbing. He also brought the gravel onto the track so practice was stopped to remove it. After some quick repairs, Kimi was back out and set a 5th fastest time.

Fellow Finn Heikki Kovalainen completed a whopping 78 laps today.

Jules Bianchi had his debut with Force India, driving 46 laps in the morning before Paul di Resta took over in the afternoon.

Tomorrow we’ll see Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel in their teams’ new cars for the first time.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas, perhaps you also got the Haynes manual for the RB6. My ability to get on the internet currently relies on the use of a Verizon MiFi right now, so needless to say it’s not very much.

from the Bruno Senna Fans Page on Facebook

Bruno Senna posted this absolutely precious picture on Facebook on Sunday. For other cute holiday photos, you must go to Karun Chandhok’s Twitter. He kept me entertained at the airport with photos with his dog.

Speaking of Chandhok, he hopes to keep his spot as reserve driver for Caterham or with another team and drive in the new World Endurance Championship. There is also the new i1 series, but Chandhok has his eyes set on racing in Le Mans. It’s possible he could join the WEC with a privateer team rather than a factory team.

Damon Hill believes that Kimi Raikkonen is definitely capable of at least one more world championship. Hill doesn’t think Raikkonen will have any problems getting back into the pace of Formula 1.

Michael Schumacher was the top passer this past season, narrowly beating out Sebastien Buemi. Schumacher made a total of 116 passes, with Buemi right behind at 114.

Sebastian Vettel. Michael Schumacher.

The German dream team beat Team Nordic and took their fifth consecutive Nation’s Cup at the annual Race of Champions.

Vettel and Schumacher defeated Team Britain, one member being fellow world champion Jenson Button, in the semi-finals.

Tomorrow the individual races will take place. Neither driver has ever been named “Champion of Champions” in this event. The most recent Formula 1 driver to win was Heikki Kovalainen in 2004.

Other Formula 1 drivers in the event: Timo Glock on the secondary German team, Vitaly Petrov on Team Slavic, and former driver David Coulthard on the all-star team.

Yas Marina Circuit

Last year’s winner: Sebastian Vettel

Schedule for race events, all times eastern:

Friday November 11
First practice session: 4am
Second practice session: 8am, live on SPEED

Saturday November 12
Third practice session: 5am
Qualifying: 8am, live on SPEED

Sunday November 13
Race: 8am, prerace show begins at 7:30am on SPEED

The big story: The fight is still on for the other top spots in the points in the penultimate race of the season. Sebastian Vettel is of course looking for his third win in as many races here in Abu Dhabi. This was the site of his first world championship win last year. Other than that, it’s basically a race for the sake of racing at this point in the season.

Since it’s so late in the season, there is plenty of talk about the future of many drivers. Force India’s situation has not been sorted out just yet. Kimi Raikkonen confirmed to MTV3 in Finland that he has been in talks with Williams. Rumor has it something could be announced this weekend in conjunction with a new Middle Eastern sponsor for the Williams team.

Nico Rosberg announced a deal with his current Mercedes team. He will race with them through 2013. His teammate, Michael Schumacher, has not yet decided about his future. It is possible he could retire after next season, while some German newspapers say he has signed a deal already to continue through 2013 with the team as well.

The young drivers’ test will take place after race weekend, with a chance for every team to look at their possibilities in the future. This weekend also features an all-star GP2 race.

DRS Zone: Let’s face the facts – this race can definitely be a bore, where the most exciting thing becomes the lights changing color on the Yas Marina Hotel. This will be the third race of the season to feature double DRS zones, in the hopes of shaking up the race into something more than a (possible) Sebastian Vettel parade.

The first DRS zone will be between turns 7 and 8, with the detection point before turn 7. The second zone will be on the straight leading to turn 11, with the detection point after turn 9.

Tires: Pirelli is back where they started – testing for their tires was first done at this circuit at the end of last year. On Friday, teams will test out a new compound for the tire supplier. For the race itself, the soft and medium compounds will be used.

Weather: As you can expect in the Middle East, the weather will be excellent for racing as usual. Dry and hot, although not too hot since Abu Dhabi is a race into the night.

Track layout image courtesy of Arz at the Wikimedia Commons.