Continuing with the unstoppable trend of the season, Mercedes is again controlled by the first line of the grill to the full by for the ninth time this season, and the fifth in the last seven grands prix. With the margin common of the more than half a second, the pole turned out to be a struggle solely between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, and the british gave a necessary blow on the table to get their eighth pole of the year, desempatando with the German.
The spectacular 1:32.850 Hamilton is the fifth fastest lap ever completed at Sepang, less than three tenths of 1:32.582 with the Fernando Alonso led the first qualifying of 2005, and also behind the times Jarno Trulli, Giancarlo Fisichella and Kimi Räikkönen, all of them registered in the same batch.
The briton reflected at a press conference, their enthusiasm for having been able to get the pole position with a certain forcefulness (4 tenths of advantage) after his difficult weekend in Singapore, where a stratagem enabled him to get on a podium that was leaking. In addition, it is confident about its prospects in the race, despite the possible competition:
“The guys have done a great job to have that kind of performance this weekend. To be able to remove it is what really makes me happy. Has been night and day compared to Singapore. Of the spins that I gave there, I could only gather a few. Here we filmed a lot, we have been able to build between sessions and I felt very comfortable in the car, I am very grateful that it is as it is“.
“On my last qualifying lap, I had the first crash of the weekend in the curve 1, so we had more time there. It is a shame not having been able to show, but still, I have the pole, and looking good for tomorrow. I’ve been here since last Saturday, I’ve been able to prepare me well and I’ve been very fast all weekend. It is too early to say how will be the career. When I’m up as I’ve been, the things tend to be on my side on Sunday. I hope that this trend will continue”.
Rosberg it was far more chary of words. In the Q3, after Q2 bit bright, made two errors in their two turns that prevented him from challenging the pole position of his companion. His last lap, however, was still good enough to hold on to second position despite the error, with tenth and a half on the Red Bull Max Verstappen, that could be your big headache tomorrow if you confirm the good pace in the race that hinted on Friday.
German, leading the championship with 8 points of advantage on Hamilton, would be the leader of Malaysia ending in the same position, but expects to be able to lead the test from the output, or have options to get out in front during the test
“Lewis has done a better job today. I was closer to him on my last lap, but I lost a couple of tenths in the last corner. I be happy with starting on the first line, as we have seen this year that there are some opportunities in the outputs, and the classification is not so important, especially at a circuit like this in which you can advance. In general, I’m pretty confident for tomorrow”.
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