Another race weekend, another threat of rain. Not the Monagasque showers, not the Emilia Romagna floods but lightning in Barcelona. Verstappen was uncomfortable in Free Practice in these conditions; was he too unsettled to qualify well? Of course not.
It was spitting as the cars went out for the first Qualifying session and weatherman Russell felt rain was on the way. Ferrari were sitting in the pits, risking losing a dry lap. Tsunoda was the first to take a trip across the gravel. Then the Ferraris were out. Perhaps they were listening to the Mercedes team radio? 6 laps later Bottas took a jaunt through the gravel and the Red Flag was brought out. Alonso also went through his native gravel and De Vries too. Then Albon. Did the stewards want everyone out on wet weather tires? No, they wanted to sweep up the gravel. From then on, rain wasn't mentioned again.
It still got very desperate in the Ferrari garage. LeClerc was in the bottom 5 until the last minute, having to take a new set of soft tires to get through and, home track hero, Sainz was called to the weigh bridge. As the chequered flag approached the track got quicker, with Albon setting a quick lap in his Williams and Norris leading the board briefly. Zhou did much better than his team mate Bottas, who was out. LeClerc was also out, continuing his abysmal year. Albon fell down the placings and out, with his team mate, Sargeant last. Magnussen completed the set.
Verstappen radioed in about being impeded by Gasly; Alonso also radioed in about this.
In the second session, Russell told his team how much he was struggling with the car. It was so bad that Sky had bleep out the b****y before his Nora. Perez let Red Bull know he was struggling with his car by taking himself out of qualifying and into the gravel. They were out of Qualifying with both Alpha Tauris and Zhou. The Mercedes also had a coming together, so Russell may have scuppered Hamilton's session too.
It was a mixed bag of competitors in the final session. Again the track got quicker and quicker as the session went on. Alonso could only hit 4th before everyone jumping ahead of him, finishing 9th. Verstappen took pole, of course, with Spaniard Sainz next to him. The Spanish will have to remember to cheer him as well as Fernando. McLaren have finally found some pace, finishing 3rd and 10th (rookie Piastri not showing as well has his more experienced team mate Norris). Norris is buddies with Verstappen and they seemed pleased to be on the pole "podium" together. Stroll was 6th and ahead of his team mate. When the Sky interviewer hinted at a podium, he showed a darker side, commenting: "Now you're teasing me..."
Gasly finished Saturday with a 6 place grid penalty - 3 for impeding Verstappen and 3 for impeding Sainz. He's basically a bollard.
Can Sainz and Norris do anything to hold onto Verstappen tomorrow? Can Perez or LeClerc come through the field. Will Norris end up still inside the top 10? Can Alonso continue his run of podiums?
No comments:
Post a Comment