Final Practice - Red Bull Dominate
by Adam Milleneuve on Mar 26th, 2011The final practice before the all important qualifying session saw the Red Bull drivers dominate the top of the timesheet, leaving Vettel and Webber to battle it out between themselves. McLaren continued their promising form too.
It really doesn't look like Hispania will be able to start the race on Sunday, neither driver has posted a competitive time, so unless they can suddenly get with 107% of the pole postion time, we'll only have 22 cars starting the race - and that's if both Virgin cars get within the time - we've been assured they will..
Here's the timesheet:
| POS | DRIVER | TEAM | BEST | DIFF | LAPS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull | 1'24.507 | 15 | |
| 2 | Mark Webber | Red Bull | 1'25.364 | 0.857 | 14 |
| 3 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren | 1'25.553 | 1.046 | 15 |
| 4 | Jenson Button | McLaren | 1'25.567 | 1.06 | 16 |
| 5 | Vitaly Petrov | Renault | 1'25.906 | 1.399 | 18 |
| 6 | Fernando Alonso | Ferrari | 1'26.121 | 1.614 | 16 |
| 7 | Kamui Kobayashi | 1'26.417 | 1.91 | 17 | |
| 8 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1'26.520 | 2.013 | 17 |
| 9 | Nick Heidfeld | Renault | 1'26.746 | 2.239 | 17 |
| 10 | M.Schumacher | Mercedes | 1'26.856 | 2.349 | 15 |
| 11 | Sebastien Buemi | Toro Rosso | 1'27.008 | 2.501 | 17 |
| 12 | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | 1'27.011 | 2.504 | 15 |
| 13 | J.Alguersuari | Toro Rosso | 1'27.066 | 2.559 | 14 |
| 14 | Paul Di Resta | Force India | 1'27.087 | 2.58 | 15 |
| 15 | Adrian Sutil | Force India | 1'27.180 | 2.673 | 15 |
| 16 | R.Barrichello | Williams | 1'28.068 | 3.561 | 7 |
| 17 | Sergio Perez | Sauber | 1'28.077 | 3.57 | 9 |
| 18 | H.Kovalainen | Lotus | 1'29.772 | 5.265 | 17 |
| 19 | Jarno Trulli | Lotus | 1'30.003 | 5.496 | 18 |
| 20 | Timo Glock | Virgin | 1'30.261 | 5.754 | 15 |
| 21 | Pastor Maldonado | Williams | 1'30.496 | 5.989 | 5 |
| 22 | J.D'Ambrosio | Virgin | 1'30.704 | 6.197 | 18 |
| 23 | N.Karthikeyan | HRT | 1'41.554 | 17.047 | 5 |
| 24 | Vitantonio Liuzzi | HRT | 1 |
If you're playing FantasyGP, make sure you have your team in place before 5am GMT, when game will close until after the race.
Comments and Discussion
FP3 107% time is 1:30.422. If it was Q1 Maldonado would've been allowed in due to his FP1+2 times, and 3 cars wouldn't have qualified.
Though apparently the teams have an 'agreement' where they'll allow cars that are slower to race regardless of what times they did. Which raises the question of the point of having the rule at all if the teams are just going to nullify its intention.
The other thing is, it gives the top teams a level of power and influence over the slower cars. It may well be that a Virgin car (i know i highlight them a lot, but they're right on the cusp) doesn't qualify this race but is allowed to compete anyway by the others: He then gets in the way of Alonso by not jumping out of the way immediately when he's being lapped, and in Malaysia doesn't qualify within 107%. Ferrari then do not allow that car to be let in as punishment for annoying them in the previous meeting.
This is wrong. The FIA should enforce the rule properly or not have it at all. If you're not in 107%, you don't race because you're too slow.