Australian GP: Williams Martini Qualifying Review
By Williams Martini Racing
March 15 2014
| Williams Martini Australian GP Qualifying Review |
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Qualifying Notes • Felipe Massa finished ninth and Valtteri Bottas 15th for tomorrow’s Australian Grand Prix. • Both cars looked competitive in the dry conditions, but struggled for grip in the wet on the intermediate tyre. • Valtteri had to change his gearbox at the end of FP3, so will take a five place grid penalty after finishing P10 in Q3. |
Felipe Massa:  "Getting
both cars into Q3 is a step forward for the team compared to last
season, but we definitely had a car capable of finishing higher up the
grid today. The car was feeling good in the dry in FP3 and Q1, but on
the wet track we were struggling with downforce in the rear of the car
and these conditions probably hurt us more than others. The race could
be very unpredictable tomorrow with reliability important, so we need to
work hard to make sure that we have no problems with the car and use our
stronger dry pace to make up some good positions."
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Valtteri Bottas: "The
changeable conditions were very tricky for everyone today and on the
whole I am a bit disappointed with finishing P10 in Q3. We had the raw
pace to finish further up, but struggled to get the intermediate and wet
tyres to work properly. But we should take a positive from getting both
cars through to Q3 as it has been a while since that has happened. It’s
a shame that we have had to change my gearbox as our reliability has
looked so good in testing, but our dry pace has looked quite strong so
if the weather is good then we will have a good chance of finishing in
the points tomorrow."
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Rod Nelson, Chief Test &
Support Engineer: "It was a very up and down qualifying session with changeable weather conditions which ended up hurting us. We had a reasonably straightforward Q1 and Q2, but did not make the most out of our intermediate tyres towards the end of Q3 and so didn’t get the sort of times on our final runs that we would have expected. On the whole this has been a promising start though and we have looked on the pace, especially in the dry. We don’t expect rain tomorrow so that should help Felipe and Valtteri gain positions and we will be looking to get both cars home in the points." |
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Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit |
Weather: Mild and changeable | ||||
|
POS |
DRIVER |
TEAM |
Q1 |
Q2 |
Q3 |
|
1 |
L Hamilton | Mercedes | 1:31.699 | 1:42.890 | 1:44.231 |
|
2 |
D Ricciardo |
Red Bull | 1:30.775 | 1:42.295 | 1:44.548 |
| 3 | N Rosberg | Mercedes | 1:32.564 | 1:42.264 | 1:44.595 |
| 9 |
F Massa |
Williams Martini Racing | 1:31.228 (3rd) | 1:44.242 (9th) | 1:48.147 (9th) |
| 10 |
V Bottas * FW36-01 Hybrid PU106A |
Williams Martini Racing | 1:31.601 (6th) | 1:43.852 (8th) | 1:48.147 (10th) |
| * Will start 15th after 5 place grid penalty | |||||
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Australian GP: Williams Martini Qualifying Review
Posted by: Williams F1 (IP Logged)
Date: 15/03/2014 11:00
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