Now it has to be acknowledged: it is the final GP weekend of the season! I´m feeling so bittersweet, I wouldn´t want the season to end! This season has gone so fast, too fast indeed. And I am ill at the moment, which doesn´t make me feel any better. I´m, however, so so happy that Formula 1 racing is there to cheer me up!
The track was wet when the qualifying got underway. The weather has been more or less rainy the whole weekend so far: drizzle, light rain, heavy rain, you name it! In Q1 everyone headed out straight away with the intermediate tyres. With about ten minutes in the clock the rain started to get heavier. Hamilton was the fastest man in the first session whilst Maldonado and Gutierrez were the first ones to be knocked out of Q2. So another failure for Maldonado, not too impressive work from the Venezuelan, who´s fighting for a seat for 2014! Heikki seemed to be doing good job at the wheel of his E21 being 5th fastest. The Finnish Williams driver Valtteri Bottas also made his way easily in to Q2 taking P12 in the standings.
The qualifying continued in wet conditions. Everyone started to the second session again with the intermediate tyres. It started to rain heavily at the end of the session and McLaren´s Perez lost the control of his car on his last attempt and crashed to the wall. Luckily the Mexican walked away unharmed in spite of the nasty-looking accident. Grosjean surprised everybody being the fastest man on track in Q2! In spite of his impressive drive in Q1 Heikki didn´t manage to make it among the top ten but was the fast man to be out of the final session! Such a shame as Grosjean showed what a huge potential there was in the E21. But that´s what motor racing is like: sometimes you succeed, sometimes you face disappointments. Heikki just didn´t manage to get everything right on his flying laps. Bottas was also out of Q3 but P13 is still a decent grid position. I mean Williams have had many poorer grid slots during the season.
Q3 was initially delayed with 10 minutes due to Perez´s crash. At the same time the intensity of the rain got higher and higher which lead to further delays due to the volume of water on the track. After the 40-minute delay the final session finally got underway. All the drivers started to the session with full-wets but they soon pitted for intermediate tyres. In the rain-soaked qualifying there was no doubt of the fastest man on track. Once again Sebastian Vettel was simply in a class of his own and claimed pole with a 6-tenth gap over Rosberg, who became 2nd! Alonso in his Ferrari qualified 3rd and showed that in wet conditions Ferrari´s pace and performance is impressive. Webber, who drove the last qualifying session of his Formula 1 career, qualified 4th, Hamilton 5th, Grosjean 6th, Ricciardo 7th, Vergne 8th, Massa 9th and Hulkenberg 10th.
It still amazes me how genuinely surprised and happy Sebastian seems every time after snatching pole or winning a race. Today on the team radio he called it incredible that he had taken pole. Doing that so often that this young man has done this season it actually can´t be considered so incredible. But these comments show how down-to-earth Sebastian really is and how he hasn´t let the incredible success carry him away. I appreciate and admire his humble attitude and I hope that he always manages to keep away from the arrogant cocky attitude. It´s so unbelievable what this man does on the track. No matter whether it´s dry or wet, this German makes magic on the track! I hope Sebastian will come to Finland to attend some racing event one day so that we´d see how he does on snow and ice! ;) Tomorrow it´ll be the 9th win in a row for him, I expect nothing more, nothing less! I want to see those doughnuts again - for the one final time this year!
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