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27.03.2013
Mercedes Civil War alonso Unhappy 200 red bull No Multi-21
malaysian team orders farce
“The champion’s subsequent excuses and outright lies were shocking.” 27 March 2013 Team orders and Multi-21 were the buzzwords after Malaysian Grand Prix winner Sebastian Vettel did himself no favours by snatching victory from teammate Mark Webber in defiance of team orders. The champion’s subsequent excuses and outright lies were shocking. He did apologise eventually but the damage was done within the Red Bull camp and beyond. At Mercedes quite the opposite transpired as Nico Rosberg was told to hold station and not challenge Lewis Hamilton for third place, which he did despite questioning the decision in no uncertain terms. Both incidents were packed with intrigue, high drama and the like - we have it all well and truly covered along with everything else that transpired on a simply amazing weekend of grand prix racing. Enjoy!
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27.03.2013 grand prix international issue.64
FIRST WORD
IN THIS ISSUE ON THE rampage
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number two
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8 Winning by mistake 18 Anger management 28 Civil war 36 Unhappy 200 44 Malaysian GP report 64 Malaysian GP results 66 Team by team analysis 72 Vettel: I f*cked up, i apologise 86 Webber: No rewind button 98 Hamilton: Nico should be here 108 Sepang qualifying report 120 sepang Session times 124 Grosjean number two 132 Mind the gap 140 Massa renaissance man 148 Sepang FP1 report 156 Sepang FP2 report 166 Mercedes quick & better 172 Sepang FP3 report 180 Driver quotes 230 Big Picture: sepang Pit stops
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ormula 1 champion Sebastian Vettel apologised to Red Bull team mate Mark Webber after ignoring orders and stealing a Malaysian Grand Prix victory from the angry Australian. “I am the black sheep right now... all I can say is apologies to Mark,� the German, seemingly contrite, said after a win that gave Red Bull a one-two finish and him the lead in the championship after two races.
The pass was deliberate, o him...but I didn’t mean to call. I made a mistake, simp Webber had driven a mast lead from fifth on the grid to ease off in the closing and tyres as he led Vettel a Hamilton.
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Triple world champion Vettel was supposed to do the same but instead attacked and passed his shocked team mate after a ferocious battle with 12 laps remaining to seal a 27th grand prix victory. The Australian made his feelings evident afterwards, saying only “Multi-21, Seb. Multi-21” - a reference to the team instruction - and giving the German the cold shoulder before they went on to the podium.
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obviously I wanted to pass ignore the strategy or the ply.” terful race to climb into the and was told by his team stages to protect the car and the Mercedes of Lewis
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“He’s not a happy camper. How he deals with it down the line we’ll wait and see. He’ll be frustrated and kicking a few doors around tonight,” his father Alan told Britain’s Sky television. Wrestling with his emotions, with the occasional heavy sigh, Webber said it would take time to absorb what had happened, “It’s still very raw at the moment because we had a plan before the race as we do for
most grands prix as to how scenario,” said the 36-yearteam in the past of favourin He alluded to the Turkish the pair collided while fighti away a lot of points, and sai to go surfing in Australia a Shanghai on April 14.
“I think this will be good medicine for me,” he said. “But there was a lot of things in my mind in the last 15 laps of the grand prix to be honest. So whether the medicine is enough, we’ll see.” The Australian said he had turned his engine down, looked after the tyres and had been “completely reassured twice that we were not going to abuse the cars on each other.”
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things will be in a certain -old, who has accused his ng Vettel. grand prix of 2010, when ing for the lead and threw id he would take time out ahead of the next race in
Team principal Christian Horner said the matter would be dealt with internally, “As far as the drivers are concerned, we let them race up to that last pitstop and then from a team’s perspective, with the issues we’ve had this weekend, we wanted to control the race and manage the tyres to the end of the race.” “But at that point the drivers’ interest became bigger than the team’s and they took it into their own hands to start racing each other which was obviously uncomfortable for us. But they are race drivers. We’ll sit down with them and discuss it as a team. They’ve raced each other hard before. They are very competitive. They are both race car drivers, It’s difficult.” Horner recognised there was a “conflict of interest” between the team’s aims and that of the driver but said the team was paramount. “You are still part of a team and at the end of the day everybody has to do their bit within the team and it’s difficult to watch. And the risk in a situation like that is that you give up 43 points,” he said. Vettel appeared ready to soak up the criticism, “I am not really too worried, I don’t really care about the criticism that is coming up now. I owe an explanation to Mark and the team. And that’s it. Everyone else obviously has the right to have their own opinions but for sure it is not a victory that I am very proud of because it should have been Mark’s.”
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he victim of Sebastian Vettel’s decision to ignore specific team orders, Mark Webber predicted after the race that Red Bull would protect its triple world champion, but that might not be the case this time as anger within the energy drinks camp was directed at him for his actions at Sepang. Publicly at least, Red Bull is angry the 25-year-old German ignored the team and attacked the sister car
to win the Malaysian Gran was contrite but he also cl not done “deliberately”. “I didn’t mean to ignore th Many couldn’t understan team boss Christian Horne it quite clear what his inte move on Mark.”
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nd Prix. Afterwards, Vettel Horner said it is wrong if Vettel’s comments create laimed it was a “mistake”, the impression that he might not have heard the call. “He knew what the communication was,” Horner he call,” he claimed. insisted. “He chose to ignore it. He’s obviously chosen nd what Vettel meant, and to hear what he wants to hear.” er isn’t buying it, “He made Horner said there was no point even asking Vettel – ention was by making the who had screamed ‘Get him (Webber) out of the way!’ on the radio – to give back the position he had taken.
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“Do you honestly think if we’d told him to slow down and give the place back, he’d given it back?” he insisted. Nonetheless, there are those who believe that – no matter Red Bull’s public position – Vettel is the obvious number one at Red Bull who only began to apologise late on Sunday (after the race) because he realised his actions had not been well received. The reaction of the press, for example, is near universal. “The ego is number one,” said Der Spiegel’s Ralf Bach. ”While Rosberg obeyed (Mercedes), the defiant Vettel overtook ruthlessly — probably because he has nothing to fear.” Agreed Bild newspaper’s Frank Schneider: “Vettel looked as though he was surprised by his own brutality. More and more, he reminds of his idol Michael Schumacher, who was loved and hated, and Vettel is on the way there.” The pundits also agreed, including former driver Alex Wurz, “In the end he has made his unofficial status as number one clear. So this changes nothing.” Indeed, when Horner was asked if Vettel will be punished or penalised in any way, he said only that further discussions “behind closed doors” will take place. “It appears a mild slap on the wrist is all an impotent team boss will be able to deliver to his star turn,” said Mirror correspondent Byron Young. Former Formula 1 driver Patrick Tambay told France’s RMC Sport: “I think the true character of Sebastian Vettel has been revealed. Outside the car, he is smiling and has the reputation for being very friendly. But when he puts on his helmet, he becomes a warrior, an ogre. He wants to win at all costs. It was roughly the same scenario between Mercedes’ Hamilton and Rosberg, but the latter – a very well mannered boy – followed the instructions of his boss.”
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Niki Lauda, whose own Mercedes team was embroiled in their own team orders saga, said, “Vettel won with all his might against the logic of the team. It was a serious mistake.” Former Formula 1 engineer Joan Villadelprat told El Pais newspaper: “Having two roosters in the henhouse is never easy.” According to Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport, Sauber team manager Beat Zehnder admitted: “He (Vettel) has done himself no favours. This has not gone down well in the paddock generally.” Outside the paddock, however, German tennis legend Boris Becker, a regular in the F1 paddock, said Vettel “did what a three time world champ is supposed to do... take matters in your own hands!” Speed Week’s Mathias Bruner commented: “He did the right thing as a winner, but not as a sportsman.” The most serious ramification of the Sepang saga could be Mark Webber’s career. Having shown Vettel the middle finger after the manoeuvre, the 36-year-old hinted to reporters that he could quit Red Bull or even Formula 1. Horner played that down. “Both of them have just sat in a debrief, talked very constructively about the car and focused on where we need to improve and where we need to be better for the next race. The team didn’t manipulate any situation, there was no conspiracy, so why he needs to be thinking about his future or anything like that is just pure emotion,” added the Red Bull team boss. One thing is for certain. Martin Brundle wittily observed during his Sky commentary that the so called “relationship that never was” between Vettel and Webber is now definitely over. “They are probably not going out for dinner together,” agreed Helmut Marko.
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civil The Mercedes team’s German speaking faction has spoken out against the team orders that prevented Nico Rosberg from finishing on the podium and gifted Lewis Hamilton third place in Malaysia.
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osberg pleaded over the radio to be let past his new British teammate Hamilton, who was saving fuel to the finish. Team boss Ross Brawn answered repeatedly, “Negative Nico, negative. Lewis’ pace is what we’re asking him to do. He could go a lot faster as well.” Afterwards – but before Hamilton admitted on the podium that he was uncomfortable about finishing third – Rosberg told strategist Brawn on the radio to “Remember this one.” It was a saga not unnoticed by Mercedes’ newly-arrived Austrian shareholders and bosses Niki Lauda and Toto Wolff, who were not amused. Wolff agreed, saying, “From a sporting point of view, that’s not what we want to see.” Lauda told German television RTL, “They should have let him (Rosberg) go. We need to talk to Ross, if this is the strategy to be used from now on. From a sporting perspective, that was wrong.” Brawn, whose role as team boss is believed threatened by the Austrian duo and also the likely arrival of McLaren’s Paddy Lowe, is understood to have defended the ‘team order’ on the basis that Rosberg was also low on fuel. Rosberg denied: “I did not have to save fuel. Everything was alright. I will sit down together with Ross to rethink whether this was really the right decision.” The 27-year-old’s rationale is that, with tyres in good shape and fuel in the tank, he might have been able to chase down the leading Red Bulls. According to Auto Motor und Sport, 1996 world champion Damon Hill was in agreement: “He might at least have
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been able to hurry the Red Bulls into a tyre problem.” Rosberg added: “I don’t know if I would have gotten the Red Bulls. But I felt good at the time. I was doing well and would have liked to see how far I could have gone.” Justifying his anger on the radio, he explained: “I tried to get them to reconsider their decision.” But Rosberg denied Red Bull figure Helmut Marko’s claim that the episode demonstrates that Lewis Hamilton is Mercedes’ obvious number one driver. “I can understand how this (episode) creates that impression,” Rosberg responded, “but I am sure that if I had been in front, the decision would have been the same.” Credit to Hamilton who did not even crack the faintest of smiles on the podium and said apologetically, “I have to say big congratulations to Nico. He drove a smarter and more controlled race than me this afternoon and deserved to finish where I did. The team made the call for us to hold positions and we both respected that.” Brawn said in the team report afterwards, “We had to take some measures to ensure that both cars finished. We asked Lewis and Nico to hold position and both drivers respected that. Whilst it was tough for Nico and I fully expect him to be disappointed, we have now got a car we can fight with and that there will be plenty more opportunities to achieve good results this season.” It will be interesting how the new cabal within the Silver Arrows will react to the Malaysian episode, as they could well leverage the incidents at Sepang to further alienate Brawn and force the Briton out the door. Watch this space...
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F
ernando Alonso’s 200th Formula 1 race was one for the Spaniard to forget after the Ferrari driver crashed out on the second lap of the Malaysian Grand Prix. Alonso, who roared to an unlikely victory on the same circuit in an uncompetitive car a year ago, started from third on the grid and damaged his front wing when he nudged pole-sitter Sebastian Vettel in turn two as he
fought for the lead on the o The Spaniard reflected, “W making a good start, I touche corner: it was a surprise stopped and I don’t know w Despite the fact the car was be too bad and, together wi keep going, because if we’d
then again on lap 3 or 4 to fit dry tyres, we would have dropped too far back and definitely lost the chance to finish up the front.� With all drivers starting on intermediate tyres following a heavy downpour, Alonso struggled for grip due to his damaged wing and was challenged for second place by Vettel’s Red Bull team mate Mark Webber towards the end of the opening lap.
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opening lap. We were very unlucky. After ed with Vettel at the second to find him there, almost what speed he was doing. s damaged, it didn’t seem to ith the team, we decided to d stopped immediately and
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He then opted against coming into the pits to repair the damage and his race was soon over as the front wing gave way and became wedged underneath his car as Webber overtook him on the finishing straight. Alonso slid into the turn one run off area and was soon making the long, lonely walk back to the paddock. To questions asked regarding the wisdom of staying
out instead of pitting for “It’s easy to criticise this d seemed like the right one. because here we could h Bulls, but circumstances d the wisdom of the decision played its part.�
“When you think how many off-track excursions there were in Australia without any consequence and even here when the cars first went out on track. Now we are already focusing on the coming races in China and Bahrain, where we hope to do better than last year, so that we arrive in Europe with as many points as possible,” added the Ferrari driver.
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repairs, Alonso answered, decision, but at the time it . It was certainly a shame, have fought with the Red didn’t help and apart from ns we took, bad luck really
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rix report
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eigning world champion Sebastian Vettel scored his 27th Formula 1 career victory after a dramatic Malaysian Grand Prix, which started on a wet Sepang Circuit and ended with controversy as Red Bull’s Mark Webber, who finished second, felt robbed of victory by his defiant teammate, while Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg were told to hold station from their pit wall, gifting Hamilton third pace while Rosberg was clearly faster towards the end of the race. After the heat of combat and some choice questions from the media in the post race press conference Vettel admitted, ”I messed up. I don’t care about the criticism. I owe an explanation to Mark and the team and that’s it. For sure it’s not a victory I’m very proud of because it should have been Mark’s.” “I had a very short word with Mark and then it hit me quite hard and I realised that I f*cked up. I want to say sorry to Mark. He was trying to save the car and tyres, but I took a lot of risk in passing him when he was trying. I didn’t ignore that, but I shouldn’t have done it,” added the three times world champion. Earlier the post celebrations were morose and clearly tense as Webber walked into the podium room, Vettel tried to approach him but the Australian was having none of it, saying, ”Multi-21, Seb. Multi-21″ most likely in reference to a team order.
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race report
On the podium Webber continued, ”In the end, Seb made his own decisions and will have protection as usual. I turned my engine down and as we know he’s a quick pedaller.” The Red Bull duo, who famously collided while battling for the lead during the 2010 Turkish Grand Prix, were at it again. Their inter team battle started
around lap 46 – shortly aft pits after their fourth and sporting the harder com Vettel on the medium opti car, running side by side, u slip-streaming, touching w no holds barred stuff.
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Team boss Christian Horner came over the team radio at one point and said, ”This is silly, Seb, come on.” But there was nothing to stop Vettel as he finally wrestled his way past his teammate and thereafter cantered into the distance and his first race win of the new season, but tensions were at fever pitch and looks set to remain at a high within the team.
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ter they emerged from the final stops – with Webber mpound tyres leading and ions stabbing at the sister under cutting, over cutting, wheels… you name it, it was
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Vettel’s race engineer Guillaume Rocquelin summed it up over the radio as the winner crossed the finish line on his slow down lap, ”Good job Sebastian, looks like you wanted that bad enough. Still, there will be some explaining to do.” Horner, whose management skills will be tested to the limit in the forthcoming days said, “They took it
into their own hands, whi us – we gave them instru Sebastian took it into his ow he wanted to win.” “They’ve raced each other good drivers. There are poin want to win. For the team
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ich was uncomfortable for It’s difficult when you have two competitive drivers uctions to hold station but like ours. It’s difficult to watch because you could end wn hands to win the race – up giving up 43 points. You have to remember there’s two elements to F1 – there’s a drivers’ championship r hard before – they’re very and a constructors’ championship.” nts at stake and they both Truth is the Red Bull pair delivered one of the most it’s hugely uncomfortable. thrilling duels of all time, shame controversy ensued.
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race report
Almost at the same time as the Red Bulls were raging, a civil war had also evolved between Rosberg and Hamilton. The Silver Arrows duo having their wheel to wheel battle – for third place – instead of chasing the energy drinks boys, they tripped over themselves. Hamilton was in fuel save mode, while Rosberg had plenty of race in him late on in the race. On lap 51 Rosberg declared on the radio: “I’m so much faster, let me go past.” Mercedes team boss Ross Brawn replied: “Negative Nico, negative. Lewis’ pace is what we’re asking him to do. He could go a lot faster as well.” Rosberg continued to run under Hamilton’s wing, showing his frustration with a stab here and there prompting Brawn to say, “Nico please drop back, there’s nothing to gain – I want to bring both cars home please.” In the end Hamilton took third place with Rosberg fourth and responded to Brawn’s praise over the radio by saying, “Remember this one.” Credit to Hamilton who sought out Rosberg as he climbed out of the cockpit in parc ferme, the two embraced, and on the podium the Briton was muted in his celebration. Hamilton said, ”The team did a fantastic job if I am honest I really feel Nico [Rosberg] should be standing here, he had a better race than me. I can’t say it’s the best feeling being up here but racing is racing.” The drama and tensions which shrouded the last half of the race overshadowed an equally dramatic first half. With half of Sepang dry as a bone and the other half very wet and slippery, everyone bolted on intermediates for the start and when the lights went out it was Vettel and Fernando Alonso who got the jump from the clean side of the circuit.
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But the Ferrari tagged the back of Vettel’s Red Bull, the wing on the F138 knocked seriously askew and dragged on the tarmac, kicking up sparks. Alonso nevertheless continued, actually slugging it out with Webber for second place during the entire first lap. For some reason Alonso elected to continue instead of pit for repairs at the end of lap one. Mistake. As he
came to the end of the ma and was wedged under the through the kitty litter in Tu the Ferrari driver on the oc prix start. The Spaniard mused after as always over 19 races wi
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ain straight, the wing broke are ready to recover good points in the next race!� e car. He ploughed straight Salvaging some pride for the Maranello squad was urn 1 and that was that for Felipe Massa who botched his start, from second ccasion of his 200th grand place on the grid, and spent the rest of the afternoon in recovery mode. Fifth was his reward at the end of the his early shower, �Bad luck, day, but well down on what the reds were expecting ill be compensated and we much more from their Malaysian escapade.
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race report
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One of the big disappointments of the weekend was the no show by Kimi Raikkonen. Granted the Lotus driver was penalised three grid places after impeding Rosberg during qualifying, and thus started tenth. But his race was error strewn and he simply could not find the sweet spot he found in Melbourne a week earlier.
Adding insult to injury wa by Romain Grosjean in th team’s own admission is configuration to Raikkonen and Raikkonen seventh. Man of the match in M
Hulkenberg who was battling way above his station in the Sauber. Going wheel to wheel with just about everyone on his way to eighth place. His duel with Raikkonen was a highlight, with the Iceman losing his cool and shouting on the radio, “What is he doing? He’s Malaysia must go to Nico pushing me off and now he hits me.”
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as the fact he was beaten he sister car, which by the running a step behind in n’s E21. Grosjean was sixth
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McLaren enjoyed a better showing than at the season opener with Sergio Perez finishing ninth and Jenson Button even leading the race at one point. But the performance was way down on their lofty standards, compounded by a DNF for Button when he parked the troublesome MP4-28 with a couple of laps to go. Jean Eric Vergne drove his best race to date on his way to tenth place and bagging the final point for Toro Rosso, after a race spent slugging it out with the Williams duo of Valtteri Bottas and Pastor Maldonado. Jules Bianchi continued to impress in his rookie season with Marussia. The young Frenchman was again best of the drivers toiling in the backmarker teams, finishing 13th and keeping both Caterhams behind him for the second time in a row. The pit lane was the source of plenty action with Hamilton cause of the zaniest moment of the race when he powered into the McLaren pit area instead of his Mercedes bay. His former crew waved him on, no doubt raising a chuckle despite the inevitable tension of the moment. Hamilton was bemused as he tried to explain the incident, �I just did a Jenson, for so many years I was used to driving into the McLaren pit stop I don’t know how I got it wrong, so big apologies to my team.�
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At Force India they will be musing the difference a week makes. After scoring a points finish in Melbourne, and looking strong all weekend at Sepang, they left M with a double DNF in the most frustrating manner possible. The team’s wheel nut system failed big time, making the crew look more like the K Cops than a slick F1 pit stop outfit and costing both drivers what were likely to points Team boss Vijay Mallya reported, “Unfortunately things went wrong in the pits w experienced an issue with our captive wheel nut system at the first stop, which in major delays for both cars. The issue occurred again at the second stop and it apparent we would not be able to solve it during the race. As a precaution we were f retire both cars and will have a full investigation.” Toro Rosso were fined for releasing Vergne into the path of a Caterham, causing a which the Faenza based team took on the chin, “The Stewards have fined us for a da release from a pit stop and we agree with their decision.”
a double Malaysia
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race report
Malaysian Grand Prix Sepang, Kuala Lumpur
Round 2 2013 Formula 1 World Championship
Race Result Pos 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Ret Ret Ret Ret
No 1 2 10 9 4 8 7 11 6 18 17 12 22 20 21 23 5 19 16 15 14 3
Driver Sebastian Vettel Mark Webber Lewis Hamilton Nico Rosberg Felipe Massa Romain Grosjean Kimi RäikkÜnen Nico Hulkenberg Sergio Perez Jean-Eric Vergne Valtteri Bottas Esteban Gutierrez Jules Bianchi Charles Pic Giedo van der Garde Max Chilton Jenson Button Daniel Ricciardo Pastor Maldonado Adrian Sutil Paul di Resta Fernando Alonso
Fastest Lap Sergio Perez
Team Red Bull-Renault Red Bull-Renault Mercedes Mercedes Ferrari Lotus-Renault Lotus-Renault Sauber-Ferrari McLaren-Mercedes STR-Ferrari Williams-Renault Sauber-Ferrari Marussia-Cosworth Caterham-Renault Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth McLaren-Mercedes STR-Ferrari Williams-Renault Force India-Mercedes Force India-Mercedes Ferrari
Laps Time Grid 56 1:38:56.681 1 56 +4.2 secs 5 56 +12.1 secs 4 56 +12.6 secs 6 56 +25.6 secs 2 56 +35.5 secs 11 56 +48.4 secs 10 56 +53.0 secs 12 56 +72.3 secs 9 56 +87.1 secs 17 56 +88.6 secs 18 55 +1 Lap 14 55 +1 Lap 19 55 +1 Lap 20 55 +1 Lap 22 54 +2 Laps 21 53 +3 Laps 7 51 +5 Laps 13 45 +11 Laps 16 27 +29 Laps 8 22 +34 Laps 15 1 Accident 3
Pts 25 18 15 12 10 8 6 4 2 1
McLaren … †…‡ �  Mercedes
56 1:39.199
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RACE RESULT • LAP CHART
Winner
Sebastian Vettel
Red Bull RB9
1 hour 38 minutes 56.681 seconds
ap Chart
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Drizzle/Overcast/ Sunny Air temperature 24°/26° Track temperature 30°
team-by-Team
reports
FERRARI (Felipe Massa 5, Fernando Alonso DNF) Alonso damaged his front wing at the start when he tagged Vettel. The wing then dislodged and wedged under the car at the start of lap two, sending the Ferrari into the gravel while in third place. Massa started on the front row for the first time since Bahrain 2010 and continued his resurgence.
LOTUS (Romain Grosjean 6, Kimi Raikkonen 7) Raikkonen scored points for the 19th race in succession but fell to second overall in the standings after winning the season-opener in Australia. The Finn lost part of his front wing at the start. Grosjean had to let Felipe Massa past towards the end as his tyres went off.
RED BULL (Sebastian Vettel 1, Mark Webber 2) Vettel’s 27th career win (equalling Jackie Stewart’s tally), and first of the season, was one of his most controversial after the champion ignored team orders and passed Webber in the closing laps. Vettel took the championship lead. Webber started fifth and, leading, eased up as ordered to save tyres and engine. Red Bull took the lead in the constructors’ table.
McLAREN (Sergio Perez 9, Jenson Button DNF) Perez scored his first points for McLaren since he moved from Sauber, ending a seven race drought. He also set the fastest lap. Button led the race for a while but his hopes of scoring big, a possible fifth place or better, ended when he lost time after a wheel gun problem left him with a wobbly wheel. He retired in the pits later on with heavy vibrations from the front left.
MERCEDES (Lewis Hamilton 3, Nico Rosberg 4) Hamilton’s first podium for Mercedes (and 50th of his career) since his move from McLaren owed much to Rosberg obeying team orders. Hamilton, on a four stop strategy, provided the comedy moment of the race when he pulled in to the McLaren pit. The points haul was the most on a single weekend by Mercedes since they returned as a works team in 2010.
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team-by-team
FORCE INDIA (Adrian Sutil DNF, Paul Di Resta DNF) Both drivers retired in the pits after problems with the team’s new captive wheel nut system, but prior to that were looking strong with a possible double points finish. However again Sutil seemed to get the better of Di Resta during the course of the weekend.
SAUBER (Nico Hulkenberg 8, Esteban Gutierrez 12) Hulkenberg’s first race and points for Sauber after being unable to start in Melbourne due to a fuel system problem, and he made the most of it as he battled with several of the big guns. His duel with Raikkonen was riveting. Both drivers did four stops.
MARUSSIA (Jules Bianchi 13, Max Chilton 16) Another strong performance from Bianchi, the only driver to go into the weekend with no prior experience of the circuit in any series. Chilton had to queue for his first stop.
WILLIAMS (Valtteri Bottas 11, Pastor Maldonado DNF) Still no points for the former champions. Bottas ran wide at the start but fought back from last to miss out on the points by 1.486 seconds. Maldonado smashed his front wing when he ran wide on lap 15 and then stopped on track with a KERS problem.
TORO ROSSO (Jean-Eric Vergne 10, Daniel Ricciardo DNF) Vergne opened his tally for the season but a pitlane collision with Charles Pic’s Caterham robbed him of a better result. The team were fined $13,000 for a dangerous release. Ricciardo damaged the floor when he aquaplaned off into the gravel at turn three before the start. He later retired with an exhaust problem.
CATERHAM (Charles Pic 14, Giedo van der Garde 15) Pic lost about 25 seconds due to the pitlane collision with Vergne. Van der Garde had a front left puncture at the end of the first stint. The Malaysianowned team also had problems with a failed intercom, telemetry that froze and malfunctioning timing software.
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team-by-team
2013 World Championship Season Drivers’ & Constructors’ Standings 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
Driver Points Sebastian Vettel 40 Kimi Räikkönen 31 Mark Webber 26 Lewis Hamilton 25 Felipe Massa 22 Fernando Alonso 18 Nico Rosberg 12 Romain Grosjean 9 Adrian Sutil 6 Paul di Resta 4 Nico Hulkenberg 4 Sergio Perez 2 Jenson Button 2 Jean-Eric Vergne 1 Valtteri Bottas 0 Esteban Gutierrez 0 Jules Bianchi 0 Charles Pic 0 Giedo van der Garde 0 Max Chilton 0 Daniel Ricciardo 0 Pastor Maldonado 0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Team Poin Red Bull Racing-Renault 6 Lotus-Renault 4 Ferrari 4 Mercedes 3 Force India-Mercedes 1 Sauber-Ferrari 4 McLaren-Mercedes 4 STR-Ferrari 1 Williams-Renault 0 Marussia-Cosworth 0 Caterham-Renault 0
nts 66 40 40 37 10 4 4 1 0 0 0
I got I ig If Ia
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t the call gnored it f*cked up apologise
eam orders, or rather the ignoring thereof, were the main talking point after an exciting but tense Malaysian Grand Prix, where the world witnessed Red Bull teammates Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber slug it out wheel-to-wheel for the lead of the race which Vettel eventually grabbed against team orders. He spoke after his controversial 27th Formula 1 race victory.
That’s your 27th F1 career victory. It looked pretty close out there on laps 43 and 44, take us through that. Sebastian Vettel: Obviously it was very close wheel-to-wheel racing. I think there wasn’t much room for either of us so obviously it was a tight battle. I think probably I was a little bit too keen too soon because I obviously in terms of strategy was on the soft tyre towards the end, on the softer compound, felt I had a little bit more, so yeah, obviously enjoyed the fight, had the upper hand in the end. Throughout the whole race it was very close. Mark was always a little bit ahead - I was stuck in traffic. In the middle of the race I wasn’t quite sure about the strategy but towards the end it seems to work very well because we were able to save that extra set and it came off with a little bit more speed. There is going to be friction, we heard on your team radio “congratulations, but there is some explaining to do”. How do you feel about the race itself in that respect? SV: I think obviously it’s very hot and I think if there is something to say then we need to talk internally. For sure we both enjoyed that. Of course, I’m standing in the middle now, so I probably enjoyed it a little bit more. But there is plenty of time to talk about. At the end of the day, for your championship position obviously, it’s been a great day... SV: Yeah, I think in that regard it’s obviously a long race. It’s good at this stage of the year to score points and we go from there but thinking about the championship right now, it’s way too early. I think it was a great race for the team. I think we did better on the tyres than we expected. Obviously it dried pretty quickly but we had a pretty clean race in terms of tyres after that.
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vettel interview
Can you tell us how your race unfolded. SV: Obviously it was an interesting one to start with and mixed conditions. I think we weren’t too bad on the crossover going to dries. Probably a little bit too soon. Some places on the track looked pretty dry but they turned out to be still quite a bit damp. I think coming out in traffic didn’t help, so I lost the lead at that time, which I think put us in position two, three at that time because after that it was quite a long race, trying to look after tyres. Towards the end I feel I had quite a strong pace and obviously at the very end on a new set of medium tyres had a bit more speed and it was a close fight but I think… yeah… as you can see I’m not entirely happy. I think I did a big mistake. I think we should have stayed in the positions that we were. I didn’t ignore it on purpose but I messed up in that situation and obviously took the lead which, I can see now he’s upset, but yeah, I want to be honest at least and stick to the truth and apologise. I know that it doesn’t really help his feelings right now but I think other than that, obviously a very good race for the team. We handed the tyres I think pretty well. To sum it up, apologies to Mark, obviously now the result is there but… yeah, all I can say is that I didn’t do it deliberately. What exactly do you mean? Was there some understanding between you that you’ve broken? SV: No. I think obviously we talk about these kind of things before we go into the race and its not the first time we race each other. I think the difference in pace at the end probably wasn’t fair because he was trying to save the car and the tyres and, as I said, I did not ignore that but I should have been aware, to be honest. Obviously then took quite a lot of risk to pass him and that was the end of the race then.
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vettel interview
You said that you apologise; would you feel that you owe Mark a win now? SV: We just came out of the cars a couple of minutes ago but I want to talk with him again later on without all of you. As I said before, I didn’t mean to ignore the call, it’s something we talk about many times in the year and yeah, I should have behaved better.
You say you didn’t ignore t but it was clearly a delibera how can you say that you d when clearly passing was a heard your pit wall asking y SV: I think it’s not an easy s I’m the black sheep right n
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in that position so, as I said, all I can say is apologies to Mark. I know that right now, obviously, having just come out of the car, it’s probably difficult to explain everything but the pass was deliberate, obviously I wanted to pass him, you could see that, otherwise you wouldn’t even try, but I didn’t mean to ignore the strategy or the call. I made a mistake, simply.
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the instruction on purpose ate move to pass Mark, so didn’t ignore the instruction a deliberate action - and we you not to be silly. situation for me. Obviously now. Obviously I put myself
vettel interview
Do you realise in the past there have been things like this between Senna and Prost, Villeneuve and Pironi, that if you don’t repair this, that the whole team gets in trouble and it all goes downhill? SV: Well, I think there’s plenty of food on the table for you guys. I think it’s something between Mark and myself. I think we’ve had situations in the past, never like that, so obviously there has been a lot of stories in the press written about our relationship etc. I think our relationship is very professional, obviously there’s no problems. We are not best friends. I think it’s very difficult to be best friends with any of the drivers but I think we share respect and I respect Mark as a racing driver. I remember occasions where obviously people express their opinion about Mark and his career which I thought at some stage were very disrespectful. I obviously try to be aware of what he has achieved, where he has come from, not only in Formula One but also before that and I respect that, so I respect him as a driver. Obviously we were giving each other a very hard time, probably similar to the fight that you saw on the track, not trying to give each other much room. It’s the same at every race and obviously it’s not an easy battle but in terms of team spirit etc, I think we’ve been working very well together in the past. Obviously I can see that for you it probably sounds a bit dull, because if you look back at the results, the last three years I’ve had the upper hand but I think it was always very close. At this stage, can I say much more than I made a mistake, I’m not proud that I made it. If I had the chance to do it again, I would do it differently but it doesn’t count now. I can’t change it now, maybe in the future there’s a situation where I can but I will try to explain that again to Mark and the whole team.
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vettel interview
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If there is the opportunity, to offer a victory to Mark, during the season. If there is a tough fight between you, and you are ahead and he’s behind... SV: I think we had that question already. I think it was actually the first question that I got. I think it’s something we need to think about, I need to think about but for sure, I can only say this, obviously, like I say, I made a mistake, I’m not proud of it. As I say, if I had the chance to do it again, I wouldn’t do the same but obviously there’s a lot of things that need to come together, to put ourselves in a similar position but yeah, it’s definitely something that will be remembered or should be remembered. Your teammate Mark Webber mentioned he thought about a lot of things for the last 15 laps, can you talk a bit about what you were thinking in those last 15 laps and when did you realise that you’d made the mistake? SV: As I said, I didn’t do it deliberately so I didn’t realise I had made a mistake, only when I came back but by not everybody’s but the team’s reaction, I realised. I had a very short word with Mark and then it hit me quite hard and I realised that I fucked up. Sebastian, first lap with Fernando Alonso, did you feel anything in the impact? SV: Yeah, I was a bit surprised. Obviously I had quite a good launch and I kept the lead into Turn One. We know that Turn One is not necessarily it, there’s also Turn Two and I tried to defend and because it was very slippery I had to turn in into Turn Two and got a little bit of a hit, so I’m not sure whether it was him or someone else. But when I got the hit and looked into the mirror I saw he was quite close. I don’t know what happened. I’m pretty sure he carried on after that. I think Mark passed him straight away. I was only told in the end that he didn’t finish the race. I don’t whether that is the reason. What do you think the fans of Formula 1 will think when they hear or they read that the winner is saying “I’m sorry to win, the second should be here and the third says “I’m sorry to be here my team-mate that is fourth should be here? SV: I think it’s great for you because you have a lot to write about. We have quite a while until the next race it’s good for you, I’m sure you don’t get bored. I didn’t say, I think generally, you know I’m not sorry to win, I think we both of us drove a strong race but Mark should have won. I did the mistake. I can only repeat it now. People can think in a way what they want, they will always make up their own story, but as I said I wasn’t aware until we took off our helmets really, so I’m sorry for that. But surely I will try to make up, first of all explain downstairs what happened.
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vettel interview
no rewin
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nd button
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the early part... you had a gr shape at the beginning of t Mark Webber: Yeah the fi went very well for us. I thin all of us on the intermediat yeah I think we got the rig the race with the inters, g nice. Then really it was jus You had a great race, the tyres worked well through getting everything in place
he Red Bull RB9 was the car to have at the Malaysian Grand Prix, clearly the class of the field, and up to a certain point it appeared that Mark Webber would bag maximum points until Sebastian Vettel decided differently, defying team orders to challenge and beat the Australian. Webber spoke during the post race press conference.
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the race. Obviously I had to mark Lewis off a little bit in the middle there and then after the last stop obviously the team told me the race was over, we turned the engines down and we go to the end. I want to race as well, but in the end the team made a decision, which we always say before the race is probably how it’s going to be - we look after the tyres, get the car to the end and in the end Seb made his own decisions and will have protection and that’s the way it goes.
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reat start, you were in good the race... irst part of the grand prix nk very tricky conditions for tes to start with. In the end, ght strategy I think early in getting the crossover quite st controlling the race and e towards the back end of
webber interview
So you were surprised when he went past you? MW: Yeah, well I turned my engine down and started cruising on the tyres and the fight was off. Anyway, we know he’s a quick peddler but I was disappointed with the outcome of the race. In the end the team did a good job, I had some good fans here from Australia, so thanks guys. I did my best. Can you take any positives away from the race? MW: Yeah I think there were a lot of things I did pretty well, from my driving, the start on the inters, there are a lot of areas where you can get that wrong, obviously like Fernando, that’s unusual for him. So in the end you’ve got drive slow on these tyres, we’re not pushing flat out as usual, all the leaders are driving very slow to save the tyres. Why do you have to pace yourselves at the end and why there are team orders? MW: I’m a huge sports fan and I think we want to see people give their best to the end. It’s extremely unusual to have both cars at the end of a race together and I think the team’s position is... we’ve gone through this many times with our own team and obviously now is a different situation for the future but... yeah, it’s part of Formula One. I think that when you have 500 employees and it was nip and tuck for Sebastian and I to be in the fence in turn one, Michael Schmidt’s happy but is the factory happy, are we happy? So when the blood is boiling and everyone is on the edge, then yeah, we are professionals, we are world class, we did the job but it’s not an easy situation for the team. It’s always spoken about, always has been, always will be. If you had one car teams, it’s not a problem. In some teams to have a one car team is the ideal scenario but three cars, four cars, it’s always going to be the same thing, that contact between teammates is the worst scenario for a team.
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webber interview
Given that F1 is a team sport what will you both do moving forward to repair the damage? MW: I think it’s very early days right now, it’s very raw, obviously, and we need to work out how the team goes best forwards from here. That’s obviously going to be discussed this week. I will be in Australia on my surfboard, the phone won’t be engaged, see what happens.
Emotions are raw but when does ignore team orders, d your future with the team, m MW: My mind, in the last many things, yes. Many ma
If the situation reversed in to an agreement to turn d
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station, or would you ignore the call going by what happened and pass Seb? MW: I think that question is not going to be answered right now. Let’s just say there were a lot of things going through my mind in the last 15 laps of the Grand Prix, lots of different reasons, not just from today but the future, would you stick also from the past. We’ll see what happens. We’ve got down the engine and hold three weeks before the next race.
n you have a teammate who does it make you consider maybe even in Formula 1? 15 laps was thinking that any things.
There were a lot of unknowns surrounding tyres going into this race but you’ve executed basically what was a perfect race in terms of the tyre management. That must give you some confidence for the rest of the year... MW: Yeah, you’re right, going into the event we were pretty concerned. Some of our long runs before the Grand Prix itself were pretty poor but these guys are not resting on any laurels, particularly, again, our key beacon in Adrian Newey, Adrian is working hard. The thing is I think it’s quite good for the neutral, good for the fans and good for probably new people that are following Formula One, but the old - let’s say
people who have more of a more education of where t little bit hit and miss. With not much of an idea that’s h us. I was surprised that oth us, completely, people won the case, and also I think, they need to get the tyre young drivers to learn how limit and drive absolutely Rafa Nadal and Roger Fede it’s playing with the lines, i for a five set match and w
but at the moment we’re driving at eight and a half tenths, eight tenths, conserving our pace and some more situations like this will probably happen in the future because there’s a lot of ambiguity in who’s (on the) pace and who’s quick. Seb feels he’s strong only in the middle of the race then I could respond. The racing is completely around nursing and trying to make the tyres survive and they’re not conducive to driving a car on the limit. You don’t see us really pushing on the limit. Obviously Seb and I had a push in the middle in our last stint but generally no drivers are really on the limit. I don’t know if I answered your question but anyway, that’s my little rant.
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a grasp of the sport and the sport was - it’s still a h what we had, probably how the race would go for her people were not with n’t believe that but that’s for the junior categories es and things better for w to push the cars to the on the edge. You watch erer play each other and it’s playing with precision we all enjoy watching that
webber interview
sh be
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ni co hould e here
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ewis Hamilton did not even crack a smile on the Sepang podium after he was gifted third place in the Malaysian Grand Prix at the expense of his teammate Nico Rosberg after Mercedes team principal Ross Brawn commanded the German driver to back down and hold formation despite him being substantially faster than Hamilton at that point of the race. Hamilton spoke at the post race press conference where the issue of team orders was the hot topic.
You had a very tough fight Rosberg but it seemed to b you at the end of the race. Lewis Hamilton: Yeah, ab fantastic job, it’s great to b honest I really that Nico Generally he had better p the race. He’s a great team job. On our side I was fuel-s and unable to keep the pac
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with your team-mate Nico nonetheless we brought it home, the guys did a great be all about saving fuel for job and I’m proud to be up here for them.
bsolutely. The team did a be up here for them. If I’m should be standing here. pace than me throughout m-mate and did a fantastic saving for a long, long time ce of the guys in front but
Nico was certainly asking in very strong terms to be allowed to come past you at one point, but at that point Ross appeared to have made the decision and had called the race off hadn’t he? LH: Yeah, I can’t say it’s the best feeling being up here but racing is racing and I really just have to keep looking forward.
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hamilton interview
We’ve got to ask you about that pit stop - you fancied stopping at McLaren, for old times’ sake maybe? LH: Yeah, I just did a Jenson. He did that a couple of years ago. Used to, for so many years, driving to the McLaren pit stop I don’t know how I got it wrong. So big apologies to the team. You don’t look particularly happy about it. In your case you retained the position and Nico stayed behind you to the finish. Describe your race. LH: The team did a fantastic job, so I’m very happy to be up here representing them. They’ve been working so hard over the winter and obviously welcomed me into the team so to be up here and to be on the second row for me and Nico is a great feeling. But of course, I don’t feel spectacular sitting here. Obviously I think Nico deserved to be where I am right now but obviously the team thought that, I guess, with the position in the Championship perhaps it was logical to stay in the positions we were in. But yeah, I have to say a big congratulations to Nico because he drove a much smarter and more controlled race than I did. We could hear at the end of the race while Nico was parking the car, ‘remember this one,’ he said to the team. Will you remember it too? LH: Of course, of course. How can I forget? Why do you have to pace yourselves at the end and why there are team orders? LH: These tyres make it very hard, very difficult to make them last and particularly for me, I wasn’t really able to make my tyres last as much as I wanted. I was fuel saving from an early point in the race which lost me a lot of time but generally these tyres make... it’s not fun, I didn’t enjoy the race. It’s not the same as back in the day when you had stints where you are pushing to the maximum the whole time, you had tyres that would last. Now you’re just... it’s like you have a hundred dollars and you have to spend it wisely over a period of time. It makes racing a lot different. It’s more strategic rather than pure speed racing.
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hamilton interview
Given that F1 is a team sport and team dynamic is vital, what will you do moving forward to either repair or return to that great team dynamic you both had? LH: I think it’s difficult to say for me what we do moving forward, but I will go and speak to the team and obviously whether or not I should apologise to Nico... I did say to him that he’d done a fantastic job. Would I let him past in the future if I was in the same position? I probably would.
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You said that Nico drove a really smart race and we did hear from quite early on that you were getting a lot of fuel messages, Nico was getting a few. Were you guys fuelled on the edge, were you racing too hard? What was the problem? LH: I think we were racing very hard to keep up with these guys because they were obviously on another level. We were close but really on the knife edge trying to stay with them. We were trying to be as high up, as far up, as close to them as possible, but obviously I used too much fuel. I was being asked to save fuel from very early on, perhaps we were particularly aggressive on our fuel strategy which is a little bit unfortunate. I don’t know what the situation was with Nico but for me, it loses quite a lot of time when you have to basically lift and coast for a hundred meters, fifty to a hundred meters before a corner. I think we can do a better job there and I think I can do a better job just looking after the tyres. I could see that Nico was not pushing too much at the start of his stints, which is where I was trying to keep up with these guys so I was perhaps pushing a little bit more, trying to really make the difference in the early stages of the tyres and took too much out of them but that’s the name of the game.
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qualifying
vettel blitzes
Doubts linger among certain pundits that Sebastian Vettel and his fa claim to him being a great, well in qualifying for the Malaysian Grand P world champion rubbished the theories as he mastered tricky cond pole position for Round 2 of the Formula 1 world championship.
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them all
ans cannot lay Prix, the triple ditions to take
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ith rain thoroughly drenching the Sepang track surface in the dying moments of Q2, it meant that Q3 would be tackled with intermediates by the remaining ten drivers. And with the track drying at a rate of about two seconds per lap, those who were at the rear of the
pack would benefit the mos Arguably this did help Vet a true measure was that hi Massa completed his final t had crossed the line for the Thus the German bagged h
pole in the process. And the gap between Vettel and Massa, who will start front he front row, was astoundingly just shy of a second, and the difference between Vettel and his teammate Mark Webber – who ended fifth fastest – was a resounding 2.5 seconds.
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st. ttel to a certain degree, but is closest challenger, Felipe tour after the Red Bull driver e final time in the session. his 38th Formula 1 career
qualifying report
They say a true measure of a driver’s prowess is his ability in the wet. Vettel won his first race in the wet. And throughout his career he has consistently been strong in adverse conditions. Case closed. Vettel said afterwards, “It was an interesting qualifying as we knew the rain was on the way. We expected some at the beginning of qualifying so we took a bit of a different approach to other people. Q2 was quite on edge and I think the rain probably helped us a little bit otherwise we would have had to go out again. It was just enough to go to Q3 where with the circuit drying. It was clear that it was probably better to change tyres [midway through] – we confirmed that pretty early – and I think we did the right thing. I’m a bit surprised by the gap. I had a decent lap and we managed to save tyres which could be crucial for [the race].” As in Australia a week earlier, Massa got the better of his Ferrari teammate Fernando Alonso and will start the race from the front of the grid. Ferrari will be buoyed with the strong showing in challenging conditions, and optimistic that their F138 is handy in both the wet and the dry. Alonso was third best and will head up the second row. Massa reflected, “I don’t know if we would be able to be second and third in the dry. There were some other fast cars – Webber and also Kimi. It was a good qualifying from us, we took the right decision to change tyres so maybe the rain helped a bit.”
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qualifying report
Alonso commented on his third place, �We will try to do a good race and try and score as many points as possible. We are not sure about the performance of the car [in terms of] race pace. Every run we do is inconsistent. We need to see how the race goes. We have not had big problems during the long runs on Friday. In Melbourne, the race pace was OK so there is no reason not to be optimistic.� Top of the timing screens on a couple of occasions during Q3, Lewis Hamilton ended fourth fastest with his teammate Nico Rosberg set to start, directly behind him, from sixth on the grid.
Australian GP winner Kim Melbourne race from seve seventh again when the ch this time out but the stew impeded Nico Rosberg duri three place grid penalty – he Perhaps the biggest surp turnaround by McLaren, ad behind the pace setters, the a step forward and were ac conditions that revailed in Q also able to make it beyond
the track was still dry. Jenson Button was eighth best, with Sergio Perez rounding out the top ten. The pair were bumped up a place each on the grid thanks to Raikkonen’s indiscretion. Ninth fastest and again showing impressively was Adrian Sutil in the Force India, he also benefited from the penalty handed to Raikkonen and would start eighth. Apart from comprehensively outshining teammate Paul di Resta, the comeback German ended Q1 faster than anyone and may well have been higher up the grid, than ninth, had he been luckier in Q3.
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mi Raikkonen started the enth on the grid, he was hequered flag dropped, but wards found that he had ing Q3 and was handed a e would start from tenth. prise, on the day, was the dmittedly they still lagged ey nevertheless had found ctually quite handy in the Q3, but notably they were d Q2 with both cars when
qualifying report
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There were some high profile casualties in Q2 including Romain Grosjean in the Lotus who was unfortunate to miss out on the fast lap window of opportunity in the session. By the time he emerged to do his hot lap rain had slowed the track down substantially and it was all in vain. He was 11th and out of Q3. Furthermore, he would not benefit by having tyre choice as rain gave the top ten similar options for race day.
Di Resta hogged the live exploits which included me in the dry, and then spinn who will start 15th, appear pressure of Sutil’s good form Pastor Maldonado planne at the very end of the sess to come down the Williams
from the cockpit and trundled down to the post qualy interview area. He will start from 16th. It was an early shower for his teammate Valtteri Bottas who failed to make it out of Q1. he will start from 18th on the grid. Marussia’s Jules Bianchi was again best of the back marker brigade, with Giedo van der Garde slowest of all in the Caterham.
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coverage airtime with his essing up his first fast run ning in the wet. The Scot, rs to be succumbing to the m. ed to give it one shot in Q2 sion. When the rain started s driver unbuckled himself
qualifying report
Final word to pole sitter Vettel, ”If you start in the front, you always want to finish there as well. As Fernando touched on, it will be a long race and it’s difficult to know the true pace. We confirmed what we saw in Melbourne. I’m happy with the balance of the car. Considering where we were here last year [in terms of performance], it’s a big step forward. Managing tyres will be crucial and then we go from there. Hopefully we can get to chequered flag in the same position.”
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qualifying report
Malaysian Grand Prix Sepang, Kuala Lumpur
Round 2 2013 Formula 1 World Championship
Qualifying - Saturday, 23 March 2013 Pos No 1 1 2 4 3 3 4 10 5 2 6 9 7 7 8 5 9 15 10 6 11 8 12 11 13 19 14 12 15 14 16 16 17 18 18 17 19 22 20 20 21 23 22 21
Driver Team Q1 Q2 Q3 Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1:37.899 1:37.245 1:49.674 Felipe Massa Ferrari 1:37.712 1:36.874 1:50.587 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:37.314 1:36.877 1:50.727 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:37.513 1:36.517 1:51.699 Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1:37.619 1:36.449 1:52.244 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:37.239 1:36.190 1:52.519 Kimi Räikkönen Lotus-Renault 1:36.959 1:36.640 1:52.970 Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1:37.487 1:37.117 1:53.175 Adrian Sutil Force India 1:36.809 1:36.834 1:53.439 Sergio Perez McLaren-Mercedes 1:37.702 1:37.342 1:54.136 Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1:37.363 1:37.636 Nico Hulkenberg Sauber-Ferrari 1:37.931 1:38.125 Daniel Ricciardo STR-Ferrari 1:37.722 1:38.822 Esteban Gutierrez Sauber-Ferrari 1:37.707 1:39.221 Paul di Resta Force India 1:37.493 1:44.509 Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1:37.867 No time Jean-Eric Vergne STR-Ferrari 1:38.157 Valtteri Bottas Williams-Renault 1:38.207 Jules Bianchi Marussia-Cosworth 1:38.434 Charles Pic Caterham-Renault 1:39.314 Max Chilton Marussia-Cosworth 1:39.672 Giedo van der Garde Caterham-Renault 1:39.932 Q1 107% Time 1:43.585
Free Practice 2 - Friday, 22 March 2013 Pos 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
No 7 1 4 3 2 8 9 14 10 15 6 5 11 12 18 16 19 22 17 20 21 23
Driver Kimi Räikkönen Sebastian Vettel Felipe Massa Fernando Alonso Mark Webber Romain Grosjean Nico Rosberg Paul di Resta Lewis Hamilton Adrian Sutil Sergio Perez Jenson Button Nico Hulkenberg Esteban Gutierrez Jean-Eric Vergne Pastor Maldonado Daniel Ricciardo Jules Bianchi Valtteri Bottas Charles Pic Giedo van der Garde Max Chilton
Team Lotus-Renault Red Bull-Renault Ferrari Ferrari Red Bull-Renault Lotus-Renault Mercedes Force India-Mercedes Mercedes Force India-Mercedes McLaren-Mercedes McLaren-Mercedes Sauber-Ferrari Sauber-Ferrari STR-Ferrari Williams-Renault STR-Ferrari Marussia-Cosworth Williams-Renault Caterham-Renault Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth
Time Gap Laps 1:36.569 28 1:36.588 0.019 27 1:36.661 0.092 33 1:36.985 0.416 23 1:37.026 0.457 29 1:37.206 0.637 26 1:37.448 0.879 32 1:37.571 1.002 30 1:37.574 1.005 32 1:37.788 1.219 10 1:37.838 1.269 21 1:37.865 1.296 29 1:38.068 1.499 31 1:38.645 2.076 23 1:38.738 2.169 31 1:38.801 2.232 27 1:38.904 2.335 31 1:39.508 2.939 30 1:39.660 3.091 28 1:40.757 4.188 29 1:40.768 4.199 32 1:41.438 4.869 23
Laps 13 15 14 15 14 14 12 14 12 16 7 12 12 14 10 10 8 7 8 6 8 6
SESSION RESULTS • Qualifying • FP1 • FP2 • FP3 • Free Practice 1 - Friday, 22 March 2013 Pos 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
No 2 7 1 3 9 15 4 14 10 8 5 16 6 11 12 17 18 19 21 22 20 23
Driver Mark Webber Kimi Räikkönen Sebastian Vettel Fernando Alonso Nico Rosberg Adrian Sutil Felipe Massa Paul di Resta Lewis Hamilton Romain Grosjean Jenson Button Pastor Maldonado Sergio Perez Nico Hulkenberg Esteban Gutierrez Valtteri Bottas Jean-Eric Vergne Daniel Ricciardo Giedo van der Garde Jules Bianchi Charles Pic Max Chilton
Team Red Bull-Renault Lotus-Renault Red Bull-Renault Ferrari Mercedes Force India-Mercedes Ferrari Force India-Mercedes Mercedes Lotus-Renault McLaren-Mercedes Williams-Renault McLaren-Mercedes Sauber-Ferrari Sauber-Ferrari Williams-Renault STR-Ferrari STR-Ferrari Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth
Time Gap Laps 1:36.935 15 1:37.003 0.068 15 1:37.104 0.169 21 1:37.319 0.384 13 1:37.588 0.653 19 1:37.769 0.834 17 1:37.771 0.836 15 1:37.773 0.838 15 1:37.840 0.905 18 1:37.915 0.980 17 1:38.173 1.238 16 1:38.673 1.738 16 1:38.830 1.895 17 1:39.054 2.119 17 1:39.204 2.269 16 1:39.208 2.273 19 1:39.284 2.349 17 1:39.567 2.632 16 1:40.728 3.793 17 1:40.996 4.061 14 1:41.163 4.228 18 1:41.513 4.578 14
Free Practice 3 - Saturday, 23 March 2013 Pos 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
No 1 10 15 2 7 14 5 4 9 3 16 6 11 8 17 12 18 19 20 22 21 23
Driver Sebastian Vettel Lewis Hamilton Adrian Sutil Mark Webber Kimi Räikkönen Paul di Resta Jenson Button Felipe Massa Nico Rosberg Fernando Alonso Pastor Maldonado Sergio Perez Nico Hulkenberg Romain Grosjean Valtteri Bottas Esteban Gutierrez Jean-Eric Vergne Daniel Ricciardo Charles Pic Jules Bianchi Giedo van der Garde Max Chilton
Team Red Bull-Renault Mercedes Force India-Mercedes Red Bull-Renault Lotus-Renault Force India-Mercedes McLaren-Mercedes Ferrari Mercedes Ferrari Williams-Renault McLaren-Mercedes Sauber-Ferrari Lotus-Renault Williams-Renault Sauber-Ferrari STR-Ferrari STR-Ferrari Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth Caterham-Renault Marussia-Cosworth
Time Gap Laps 1:36.435 20 1:36.568 0.133 17 1:36.588 0.153 19 1:36.613 0.178 20 1:36.806 0.371 19 1:36.807 0.372 18 1:36.822 0.387 16 1:36.946 0.511 14 1:36.949 0.514 25 1:37.302 0.867 14 1:37.359 0.924 11 1:37.538 1.103 12 1:37.685 1.250 23 1:37.690 1.255 14 1:37.936 1.501 16 1:38.294 1.859 17 1:38.376 1.941 16 1:38.425 1.990 15 1:38.995 2.560 18 1:39.717 3.282 21 1:40.209 3.774 18 1:40.495 4.060 18
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otus have been giving Formula 1 championship leader Kimi Raikkonen preferential treatment over his French team mate Romain Grosjean, technical director James Allison said on Friday. Raikkonen, the 2007 world champion with Ferrari, won last weekend’s Australian seasonopener from seventh place on the starting grid after managing the tyres beautifully and doing one less stop than his closest rivals. The Finn was fastest again in free practice for the Malaysian Grand Prix on Friday with Grosjean 10th and sixth in the two sessions at Sepang. Allison told reporters afterwards that Grosjean was at a disadvantage because he did not have the same package as Raikkonen. “He’s not had an easy weekend either here or there (Australia), because we haven’t been able to provide two cars in exactly the same configuration on either occasions,” said Allison. “In Melbourne on Friday he was running a step behind Kimi in terms of his aero package, and then he had the upgrade for Saturday morning but then Saturday was disturbed by the weather. Here, once again, we only have one set of (new) kit and we’ve chosen to run that with Kimi and Romain is disadvantaged for that.”
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number two
Allison blamed the situation on Formula 1 rules forbidding testing during the season, leaving all upgrades to be tested on race weekends. “You try to upgrade the cars as fast as you can and generally speaking, that means that you’re always going to have one set of kit ahead of the second set and that almost inevitably means that one driver gets to try it before there is a second one available,” he added. “We will always try to get two sets available but it’s not always possible. So he (Grosjean) has had a difficult set of circumstances and he’s also up against a team mate who is really firing on all cylinders so those are the two things.” Allison said a combination of patience and a good car had helped Raikkonen, who made his comeback last season after two years out, regain his form of old. “He’s certainly very, very relaxed and confident this year. He drove the race incredibly patiently. I think he knew he had a good car under him,” Allison said of Melbourne. “He knew he didn’t have to scamper up behind the group in front and he looked after the tyres, only going quickly when he needed to. It was just a very mature and smooth, fast race.”
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mind th
Sebastian Vettel tip-toed through the early stages of qualifying for the Malaysian Grand Prix before blasting to pole position at a rain-hit Sepang Circuit with a well-timed change of tyres.
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ed Bull’s triple world champion secured the 38th pole of his Formula 1 career after opting for a new set of intermediates on a drying track to hold off the twin Ferrari threat of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso, who adopted a similar strategy. After the disappointment of Melbourne, when he dominated qualifying in the season opener before
finishing third behind Kim Alonso, Vettel was careful w “It was an interesting qu that rain was the on the w expected some at the beg didn’t come,” he told report The German drove conserv of qualifying and was nint
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second phase when the first drops of rain prevented anyone from improving on their times and the top 10 advanced to the final round. “I think we had a bit of a different approach to other people. Q2 was quite on edge I would say, so probably the rain helped us a little bit. Otherwise I think we would have had to go out again. But in that case it was just enough to go through to the final phase,� he said.
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mi Raikkonen’s Lotus and with his tyres on Saturday. ualifying session. We knew way and to be honest we ginning of qualifying but it ters. vatively in the early phases th towards the end of the
mind the gap
“Then in Q3 with the circuit drying, it was clear it was better to change tyres. We confirmed that pretty early. I think we did the right thing. Very tricky because you don’t know if there’s more rain coming or not, but we took the decision.” The rain held off and Vettel eased ahead of early pacesetter Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes before watching Massa claim second place and Alonso third, although both Ferraris were almost a second behind. “I’m a bit surprised by the gap but it was a decent lap and I was very happy obviously. It was quite tricky because some parts of the track were still wet and others were dry but overall a very good session for us,” he added. “We managed to save some tyres, which could be crucial, so we’ll see what we can do.” Team mate Mark Webber will start in fifth place but the Australian cut a dejected figure after he was unable to set a final flying lap as he ran out of time due to a misunderstanding. “I think we got out of the car what we could have done, on the laps when I was pushing,” he said. “Then we basically didn’t push when the track was at its quickest because we thought we had a bit more time - well, I thought I had more time and more laps to play with. At the end, I got the red light when I went over for the last lap. Frustrating, that’s the way it goes sometimes. We’re fifth and I can still race from there.”
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renaissa
Ferrari’s Felipe Massa is fast becoming the renaissance man of Formula 1 after a strong start to the season following signs of improvement at the end of last year.
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assa’s seat came under intense pressure last season but the Italian team’s decision to retain his services appears to be bearing fruit as he out-qualified team mate Fernando Alonso for a fourth straight race at the Malaysian Grand Prix. The 31-year-old Brazilian made full use of a late stop for fresh intermediate tyres on a drying Sepang Circuit to claim second spot on the grid behind Red Bull’s
Sebastian Vettel, pushing his first front row start sinc “I feel comfortable in the ca comfortable you can do a go car to the maximum, it’s p qualified and finished four race in Melbourne last wee “It was really clear that I year and the year before, s
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car, bad luck, around myself as well, so there were so many things that were not working in the proper direction, but now they are.� Massa finished second to Lewis Hamilton in the 2008 drivers’ championship but suffered a serious head injury when hit by debris at the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix, missing the rest of the season. He struggled to rediscover his best form but managed podium finishes in Japan and Brazil in the second half of last year. photo sutton images
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Alonso back to third with ce 2010. ar. I think whenever you feel ood lap and you can use the possible,� said Massa, who rth in the season-opening ekend. I was not comfortable last so many things around the
renaissance man
“I know how quick I can be, I’ve showed that many times in the past. If everything works well, we can be competitive, it’s pretty sure about that,” he added. “I believe in myself and I think it can be really important for the team, for Fernando as well, for everybody. We need a stronger team, a strong position and fighting for the best position in every race so I’m happy, that’s a good direction.” Team principal Stefano Domenicali was quick to heap praise on Massa and was happy to see the team’s confidence in the driver being rewarded. “That’s what I want, and that’s what I said since last year when everyone was pushing me to do something different,” the Italian said. “But I am happy for him and for the team because as always, we think as a team.” Alonso had seemed to be waging a lone war against the Red Bulls in recent years but the Spaniard said Massa had not been as far off the pace as results had suggested. “I’ve been racing 27 years now in motor racing - I’m getting old - so it’s not the first time that we have very close competition,” the 31-year-old double champion told reporters. “It was very close the last three years as well, but I know that for you, it was not that close in terms of results because Felipe had some bad luck, some incidents sometimes, some mechanical problems other times but the last three years was much closer than it looked in the points at the end.”
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FREE PRACTICE 1
webber fastest Mark Webber set the early pace in the opening free practice session of the Malaysian Grand Prix weekend, at Sepang International Circuit, heading up a trio of Renault powered cars.
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ebber, who set a best time of 1:36.93, was the only driver to dip below the 97 seconds mark, but was only 0.068 up on Australian Grand Prix winner Kimi Raikkonen . The Lotus driver set his best time on his first flyer, after spending much of the first half of the session watching his mechanics sort out a technical issue with the floor on the E21. By then though, Webber had set the benchmark time which would remain top of the
timing screens until the ses Webber’s Red Bull teamm third quickest at the end of t under bright blue skies with typical of a Malaysian day i Next best was last year’s Alonso in the Ferrari F138 down on the top time and his teammate Felipe Mass
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seventh on the timing sheets. Nico Rosberg was fastest of the Mercedes powered brigade, ahead of Force India’s returnee Adrian Sutil who was sixth, teammate Paul di Resta was eighth ahead of ninth fastest who was Lewis Hamilton in the Mercedes W04. Romain Grosjean was tenth on the timing screens in the Lotus, albeit almost a second down on Raikkonen – the top ten were separated by under one second.
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ssion ended. mate Sebastian Vettel was the ninety minutes session, h hot and humid conditions in March. s Sepang winner Fernando 8, who was 0.384 seconds about half a second up on sa who ended the session
free practice 1 report
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As expected McLaren were struggling again on day one, with Jenson Button ending the session 11th, albeit 1.238 seconds down on the top pace, while teammate Sergio Perez could only manage 13th which was 1.895 off Webber’s best. Williams, who also endured a miserable weekend in Melbourne, were again on the wrong half of the timing screens with Pastor Maldonado 12th, but 1.738
seconds of Webber. Team Bottas was 16th, over two time of the morning. The exact pecking order emerged art this stage, how Red Bull duo have strong s – particularly Raikkonen – Ferrari pair. Mercedes apep
mmate, and rookie, Valtteri door, but still apparently struggling for grip. o seconds shy of the best Force India looked to have carried their good form from Albert Park to Sepang, while McLaren’s woes in Malaysia had not fully seemed set to continue. wever a given was that the Amid the uncertainties in Malaysia, one certainty was short stint pace, with Lotus clear: tyres were going to play a vital factor during the – also strong as were the course of the weekend and perhaps even throughout pared to be knocking on the the entire season...
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free practice 1 report
FREE PRACTICE 2
momentum wit The second free practice session of the opening day in Malaysia got underway with dark clouds threatening, and eventually dropping their load just before the hour mark and lasted for about 20 minutes. The track remained wet until about 15 minutes to go, when a dry line appeared and times began to drop to the level witnessed at the start of the session.
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th raikkonen
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imi Raikkonen’s best time of 1:35.569 was set shortly after the half hour mark, before the rain descended, displacing Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel from top spot on the timing screens by 0.019 seconds. And that’s how it remained at the summit until the chequered flag dropped to bring the day’s action to an end. Raikkonen summed up his day, “We tried changing a few things on the car and made progress with where we wanted to be at the end of the sessions. We had some running in the wet which you often get around here and the car feels fine. We ran pretty heavy so I don’t know how we’ll be when everyone is light for qualifying, but I’m happy with where we are.” Vettel told BBC afterwards, “We didn’t get as much done as we wanted to but that’s the same for everyone. One part of the track was quite soaked and one part pretty dry.” “This afternoon we couldn’t do that much [race preparation] because of the weather. It looked pretty OK but quite a mess if you look at how long the tyres last. There is some footage to look at too; it doesn’t look very nice, I have to say. I hope we have enough tyres to survive the race. Tyre wear was pretty severe for everyone.”
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free practice 2 report
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Also less than a tenth off the fastest time was Felipe Massa, third fastest in the Ferrari, which was nevertheless 0.324 up on teammate Fernando Alonso who was fourth. Massa did 33 laps in the process which was more than anyone else in the session. Mark Webber, who was fastest in FP1 earlier in the morning, ended his day fifth best.
Lotus admitted in Malays Grosjean’s disposal was n teammate’s model. Thus n ended the day sixth, a half s in FP1 he had been a secon Notably the top six on th Ferrari and Renault powere
Nico Rosberg was the fastest of the half dozen Mercedes powered drivers with Force India’s Paul di Resta eighth, Lewis Hamilton ninth in the Mercedes and Adrian Sutil tenth in the Force India. Out of the top ten and over 1.2 seconds down on the FP2 topping time was the best of the McLaren boys with Sergio Perez 11th, ahead of Jenson Button in
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sia that the E21 at Romain not quite the same as his no surprise the Frenchman second down on Raikkonen, nd off the Iceman’s best. he FP2 timing sheets were ed drivers.
free practice 2 report
12th. Sauber duo Nico Hulkenberg and rookie Esteban Gutierrez were 13th and 14th respectively. The young Mexican having a drama packed day with a fire extinguisher accidentally activating in his car, and then a broken exhaust compromising his day. Williams were way out the ball park with Pastor Maldonado 16th and Valtteri Bottas down in 19th, was slower than Jules Bianchi – the Marussia driver again the pick of the battle at the back.
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free practice 2 report
quick &
Lewis Hamilton was confident his Mercedes would be mo competitive at the Malaysian Grand Prix than it was in Melbourn after an encouraging first day of free practice at Sepang.
ore ne
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amilton qualified third but finished fifth in the first competitive outing for his new team at Albert Park and despite not being able to match the one-lap speed of his rivals at Sepang, the Briton was buoyed by his day’s work. “It felt quick and better than it did in the last race and fingers crossed it will be,” the 2008 world champion told reporters, despite lapping more than a second slower than Melbourne winner Kimi Raikkonen’s Lotus. “We have taken a step forward on long-run pace but the others look pretty quick as well, so it’s difficult to judge where we are. The Lotus looks really quick and it’s not until after I analyse the laps that I can judge how good ours was,” said Hamilton, who was ninth in both sessions at Sepang. Managing tyres appears to be the main dilemma facing most teams this season and after rapid degradation cost Hamilton a chance of a podium in Australia, the Briton feels his team are learning how to get the most out of the Pirellis. “In the first session, we did chew up the tyres a bit but that was mostly due to the set up of the car, which had a lot of oversteer,” he added. “I think we are stronger race-pace wise. When we did the long-run, it felt pretty strong.” Mercedes team principal Ross Brawn hinted that Hamilton and team mate Nico Rosberg were carrying heavier fuel loads than normal to get a better gauge of how the tyres reacted in race conditions. Brawn’s comments indicate the team would be more competitive in qualifying on Saturday but Rosberg was quick to downplay the raw speed of the Mercedes compared to the front runners. “We have been concentrating on the long-run performance because that was a little bit our problem in Melbourne and we’re doing better there,” the German said. “On the short run, it wasn’t looking that great so maybe we’re a little bit behind.”
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quick & better
FREE PRACTICE 3
vettel signals World champion Sebastian Vettel, in the Red Bull RB9, topped the final free practice session with a strong showing in the one hour session prior to all important qualifying, with Lewis Hamilton enjoying good pace to clock the second best time.
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ettel left it late in the session to bang down his best time which was 0.133 up on the next best, and exactly the difference to Kimi Raikkonen’s top time the previous day – in other words no one had gone faster around Sepang up until that point. Teammate Mark Webber was fourth fastest. Clearly the team’s RB9 boasts great one lap pace, the
question is: can they harn make the tyres last in the win? Not only in Malaysia b After a relatively subdued powered drivers, Hamilton h time he went out his lap tim the screens.
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Next up in third, and reveling in his return to the sport after a one year lay-off, was Adrian Sutil in the Force India. Teammate Paul di Resta was sixth. Some set-up changes overnight to his Lotus E21 were apparently not for the better as Kimi Raikkonen, who lit up day one, ended fifth fastest which was 0.371 down on Vettel’s best and down on his FP2 best.
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ness this performance and e race and enable them to but everywhere else too. d opening day for Mercedes had his race face on as each mes were at the top end of
free practice 3 report
It’s been doom and gloom in the McLaren pit from the very first official practice in Australia, but perhaps there was light at the end of the tunnel for the Woking squad as Jenson Button ended the session seventh fastest in the below par MP4-28, the Woking squad’s
best showing to that point. S Ferrari were working to thei hot laps did not appear to be As a result Felipe Massa e Fernando Alonso 10th. Spli
was Nico Rosberg in the Mercedes. FP3 had the air of a cat-and-mouse affair, with no one really showing their hand ahead of what was likely to be an intriguing qualifying where, Red Bull emerged as favourites for the top spot grid slot.
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Sergio Perez was 12th. ir own programme where e on their low key agenda. ended eighth best, with itting the reds, in ninth,
free practice 3 report
driver q
quotes
SEBASTIAN VETTEL
I messed can’t. I ca what I did them late do if and translate to fightin and not k the call t destroyin was wron mistake a to Mark a photo getty images
d up. I would love to come up with a nice excuse as to why I did it, but I an understand Mark’s frustration and the team not being happy with d; I owe an explanation to him and the whole team. I will try to explain to er. We talk about this situation happening many times and what we will d when it happens and normally it doesn’t, but it did and I should have ed the call into action. I got the call and I ignored it. Mark and I are used ng each other when we’re close, but with the tyres how they are now, knowing how long they will last, it was an extremely big risk to ignore to stay second. We could have ended up finishing eighth or ninth after ng the tyres in those two laps; I put myself above a team decision, which ng. I didn’t mean to and I apologise. I’m not happy I’ve won, I made a and if I could undo it I would. It’s not easy right now and I owe apologies and the team.
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DRIVER QUOTES
MARK WEBBER
I think Sebastian has respect for me and I have respect for him, but the situation was not handled well. It’s hard to put your finger on it all now after the race; when we’re racing on the limit and pushing as hard as we can, then it’s the worst situation for a team. I am sure they are bricking themselves and know that things can go wrong. There’s a bit of history to this as well; my mind in the last 15 laps was thinking about a lot of things, but I was happy with the way I drove. I tried to isolate what happened at the end and we got something out of it, but of course I’m not satisfied with the result. This puts heat on a few people and unfortunately there’s no rewind button. I know people want raw emotion from us after these situations and it’s there, but we need to remain cool. There’s three weeks until the next race, so time for us to work on things.
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DRIVER QUOTES
FERNANDO ALONSO
Unfortunately, we were very unlucky. After making a good start, I touched with Vettel at the second corner: it was a surprise to find him there, almost stopped and I don’t know what speed he was doing. Despite the fact the car was damaged, it didn’t seem to be too bad and, together with the team, we decided to keep going, because if we’d stopped immediately
and then again on lap 3 o would have dropped too lost the chance to finish u criticise this decision, but like the right one. It wa because here we could Red Bulls, but circumsta apart from the wisdom of
bad luck really played its part, when you think how many off-track excursions there were in Australia without any consequence and even here when the cars first went out on track. Now we are already focusing on the coming races in China and Bahrain, where we hope to do better than last year, so that we arrive in Europe with as many points as possible
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or 4 to fit dry tyres, we far back and definitely up the front. It’s easy to t at the time it seemed as certainly a shame, have fought with the ances didn’t help and f the decisions we took,
DRIVER QUOTES
FElipe massa
The race was really complicated, because starting with a new set of inte damp at some points and completely dry at others, prevented me from h to many other drivers on the first lap. Maybe bringing forward the first sto choice, because the track was still damp and this cost me time. Then on th degradation wasn’t excessive and I managed to settle into a good pace, bu on the podium had vanished. I can’t say I’m satisfied with this result, but start of the race, I am happy to bring home a good points haul
ermediates on a track that was very having a good pace and I lost ground op to fit dry tyres was a slightly risky he dry track, the car improved, the tyre ut at that point, any hope of finishing t given all the difficulties I had at the photo sutton images
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DRIVER QUOTES
JENSON BUTTON We drove a good race. Strategy-wise, we did everything right. We pitted on the correct laps and looked after the tyres exactly as we should have done. We’d have finished fifth but for the problem in the pitstop – maybe we’d even have been in the battle for third and fourth. It’s very disappointing that we weren’t able to demonstrate that, of course. Even at
the end we had a chan but unfortunately I wa front left [tyre] by that up, and it was producing that I think the guys wer damage the front left s on. However, as I say, a problem, I think we did a
made improvements over the past week, and the result of those improvements was that we were more competitive here in Malaysia than we were in Australia last weekend, so there are definitely positives that we can take away with us. Hopefully, in China in two weeks’ time, we can continue that steady improvement and score a few more points.
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nce of scoring a point, as struggling with my stage. It kept locking g such a bad vibration re worried that it might suspension if I carried apart from the pitstop a pretty good job. We’ve
DRIVER QUOTES
SERGIO PEREZ
“This afternoon my engineers sorted out a very good race strategy that enab in front of me early on – so thank you and well done for that, guys. Unf race, my tyres began to degrade a bit too much, especially my front left, an risky to try to drive to the finish on that set. Consequently, we had no real pitstop, which caused me to lose position. I still ended up ninth, which is Melbourne last weekend, so I think it’s fair to say that we can see that pro two weeks’ time let’s hope that upward trend continues.
bled me to pass the cars immediately fortunately, towards the end of the nd we therefore felt it would be too option other than to make an extra two places better than I finished in ogress is being made. In Shanghai in
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DRIVER QUOTES
LEWIS HAMILTON That was a fantastic job by the team. They worked so hard over the winter and to achieve a podium at the second race of the season is a nice reward, particularly here in Malaysia at one of our home races. I have to say big congratulations to Nico. He drove a smarter and more controlled race than me this afternoon and deserved to finish where I did. The team made the call for us to hold positions and we both respected that. The race was tough, we were fighting hard with Red Bull and went aggressive on our fuel strategy but they were just too good. Third and fourth places is still a great result for us however and just increases our motivation to keep pushing and close that gap
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DRIVER QUOTES
NICO ROSBERG
It was a great day for us as a team and we can be very happy of our perform It was a good feeling to be competitive and to be able to set fastest lap Thanks to all of you at the team for all the hard work, results like these a course, it was disappointing for me having to hold position but I understan safeguard our positions and to make sure that both cars got to the end w especially in light of the tough times behind us. There are a lot of races to makes me look forward to fighting for more podium finishes in the future
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mance here this weekend. p times during the race. are very well deserved. Of nd the team’s decision to with a strong team finish, o go and our performance e.
DRIVER QUOTES
KIMI RAIKKONEN
Although the car felt very good on Friday. On Saturday and in the race day have been pretty difficult. Since Saturday morning it has not been behaving as we expected for some reason, especially in the wet where we really struggled for grip. It was a tough race and I lost part of my front wing at the start which didn’t help, but at least we scored a few points which is better than coming away with nothing. If we can get the car back to how it was in Australia then I’m sure we’ll be at the front again.
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DRIVER QUOTES
ROMAIN GROSJEAN
I think we can be quite happy with the result. It was a tough race, starting expect in Malaysia. I spent a lot of time stuck behind Felipe [Massa] in th could have passed him earlier then I would have stayed ahead, but by the just to let him through. It’s not the result we would have wanted at the b the day it’s more points for the team and we’ll try to come back stronger i
g wet and finishing dry, but that’s what you he middle phase of the race and I’m sure if I e end my tyres were finished so it was best beginning of the weekend, but at the end of in Shanghai.
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DRIVER QUOTES
PAUL DI RESTA
It’s frustrating to come away with nothing given how competitive we have Adrian’s first pit stop when I was sat behind him, which cost me about 15 with the wheel nut at my second pit stop. As a precaution the team chose t have the performance in the car, but this is definitely a missed opportuni a lot of points. We will go away, take this on the chin, and come back fight
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e looked all weekend. We saw an issue at 5 seconds, and then I had the same issue to retire the car. The good news is that we ity because we had the potential to score ting in China.�
DRIVER QUOTES
adrian sutil
An early end to a race that promised so much for us. Both cars had the sam cost us a lot of time in the pits. We’re not sure exactly what happened yet sure we understand the issue. It’s a shame that this happened here beca very comfortable as the track dried out. We have to stay positive, keep ou are plenty of races left where we can make up for the disappointment .
me problem with the wheel nuts and it t so the team stopped the cars to make ause we had a very quick car and I felt ur heads up and remember that there
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DRIVER QUOTES
NICO HULKENBERG
I feel quite well rewarded going home with four points after my first race o in a new team and with a new car. I am quite happy with how it went, espe start of the race when we were quite quick on the intermediates. But then in traffic and couldn’t find my way past other drivers. I think eighth was we considering I had to fight and push a lot. I think the potential is there, and n to work on a few details.
of the season ecially at the n I was stuck ell deserved, now we have photo sutton images
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DRIVER QUOTES
Esteban Gutierrez
P12 is an ok result, but Ideally we would have liked to finish in the points. At the end of the race we lost time because we stayed on the same set of tyres for too long. We tried to change the strategy and I did my best. That was all we could do at that stage. Overall the weekend is a step forward and we need to keep working and put everything together to achieve points.
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DRIVER QUOTES
PASTOR MALDONADO
The intermediate tyres made the start of the race very difficult as it was very slippery, particularly in the first sector. We had a good strategy to pit earlier in the race and opt for the dry tyres. I made a small mistake on braking into Turn 11 which forced me to run wide and damage the front wing slightly. After a new set of tyres, the pace in the second stint was good, but unfortunately my race ended early after a KERS problem forced us to retire the car. We will now work hard to prepare as best we can for the next two flyaway races.
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DRIVER QUOTES
Valtteri Bottas
I had a good start but then I drove off the dry line racing van der Garde a wide dropping to the back of the field. Once the track started to dry I was start overtaking a few cars and I had a good, clean race. The team did a gr with the strategy and with a few more laps I could have started attackin championship point. We maximised what we had but I trust in the team t can now continue working together to improve.
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DRIVER QUOTES
Daniel Ricciardo I compromised my race even before the start when the conditions were very slippery, aquaplaning off at Turn 3. I managed to keep going, but I went across the gravel quite fast and damaged the floor. That probably played a part in my problem at the end. I got a reasonable start and made up a few places and was pretty pleased with the first couple of laps. But I did not have the pace to keep the Lotuses behind me and stay in the top ten, even though the switch to dry tyres was well timed. Like I said, I think the damage on that opening lap affected my overall performance all race long.
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DRIVER QUOTES
Jean eric vergne It’s good to finish in the points, but it’s a shame that a mistake in the pits cost us so much, as I could have done something better. So, overall I feel rather frustrated. But I’ll take the point gladly. After these first two races, we now have a short break before we go racing again and we must use that time to take a close look at how we performed and where we can do better, because there is certainly a lot of room for improvement, as both these two races have been missed opportunities. On the positive side, again, once we got over our problems I had a good race pace and managed to make up a lot of places.
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DRIVER QUOTES
giedo van der garde “I had a really good start, really strong and the car felt great on the inters for the first stint. Just when the conditions were going from wet to dry I heard over the radio that I had a front left puncture but it was exactly at the time we were coming in to switch to the dry tyres so it only cost me a little bit of time. I came back out on the mediums and was running well in 17th with really good balance. From there the race was ok. The rain that had been forecast didn’t come so we didn’t have another chance to show what we can do on the inters and that’s a shame as
I’m definitely quick on th felt much better on both hard compounds we put third stops than it had in the same oversteer prob qualifying but we still hav oversteer on entry into th at that again in China. W on improving our setup maximising every run in t help us get the most out afternoons and that will d
a stronger showing in quali. I also want to say what a good job the boys did in the stops. It was pretty tight with Chilton each time but I stayed ahead of him after good work on the pitwall and really strong work from the pitcrew. When we finished I thanked them on the radio, and after the race Tony Fernandes told the whole team how proud he was of the work he’d seen in the stops. He’s right – the boys are pushing hard and it’s good to see the efforts we’re making in the car are the same across the whole team.
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hose tyres, but the car h the medium and the t on in the second and qualifying. I didn’t have blems I had in FP3 or ve work to do to reduce he corners and we’ll look We’re also going to work options for qualifying, the practice sessions to t of the car on Saturday definitely help us put in
DRIVER QUOTES
CHARLES pIC Off the line I had a great start and was up with Giedo for the first few laps while the track was wet enough for the inters. The team called me in to change onto the medium tyres for the first stint in the dry but as I was coming in to the box I saw Vergne being released right in front of me and I couldn’t avoid him as I was turning in and there was nothing I could do to avoid their
mistake. The guys did a the nose and the tyres an losing about 25 seconds – the pitcrew train for and stop. It’s such a shame t as we could definitely ha hadn’t happened. It may and while that’s frustrat
see how well everyone reacted and to see that we didn’t stop pushing, on the pitwall or in the garage. We stopped another three times after that, going onto hard compounds for two stints and mediums for the last 13 laps. The car felt good throughout the race. I was able to push right to the flag and without the pitlane issue I’m sure the final result would look different.
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brilliant job to change nd I was out again after – that’s the sort of thing d it paid off in that first that incident happened ave finished better if it y have cost us a place ting it’s also positive to
DRIVER QUOTES
jules bianchi Obviously I’m delighted to finish 13th, after 15th in my first race last weekend. I hope this is a trend we can continue! It was not an easy day though as we made life more difficult with a not so good start and opening lap and this really hurt the first part of my race. The lap time was really coming towards the end of the first stint but I was stuck behind the Caterham and unable to do much with it. After 18 laps or so I was able to get back into position and from then on I was
v a f i p t n
very happy with my progress. It was nice to have held off Maldonado and to maintain the gap for so long. This shows we have the car to fight with them in the future. There are some things to learn from and improve after and the weekend generally, but we have also made more progress already since Melbourne and we need to keep pushing. My thanks to the Team for a lot of hard work and more to come between now and China.
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DRIVER QUOTES
max chilton
I’m slightly disappointed with because it seemed so many things were against work well and I lost a lot of time on the opening lap. That setback and being stuc really defined my race, which is tough to take because you know instinctively th going to come much sooner in the race. The car performance is there and so is m work to do to bring all of that together and maximise every part of the race, in the blue flag phase. I’m sure that focus will ensure we can come back stronger the Team this weekend as it has not been an easy time.
us. First, the start didn’t ck behind the Caterhams hat the blue flag period is my pace, but there’s some ncluding how we manage r in China. A good job by
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DRIVER QUOTES
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