'Microscopic margins' split the top two as Hamilton fails to halt Rosberg's perfect start, a difficult day for McLaren, Vettel, and...
Monday 10 October 2016 10:43, UK
The unbelievable margins between first and second
The iconic Suzuka race track is 3.608 miles long, or 5794 metres, joined together by 18 corners of ranging difficulty and speed. The top two here were separated by 0.013s, which translates to, incredibly, just 82 centimetres.
"There was nothing between it, the whole lap," said Sky F1's Anthony Davidson. "I've never seen anything like it."
The microscopic margins of Formula 1.
Clean sweep for Nico, battle on for Lewis
Provisional pole for Lewis Hamilton usually means only one thing, especially at a drivers' track like Suzuka. But it says a lot about Nico Rosberg's current form and state of mind that he recovered from the mistake on his first Q3 run to nail his pole lap in the closing moments.
The German has been impeccable this weekend, sealing a clean sweep of fastest times in every practice and qualifying session. There can be no hint of a Mercedes sabotage from Hamilton on this occasion. This was just a driver at his very best.
Perhaps Lewis has been hampered by his set-up in Suzuka, with the Brit admitting he was in "no man's land" heading into qualifying. But while the world champion did his best to hide the disappointment in losing out to his team-mate, insisting he did all that he could do, the fact that Rosberg was just the tiniest bit faster will be eating away at him.
Thirteen thousands of a second is not a large gap, by any means, but the way these last few races have panned out it was always going to go in Rosberg's favour. Rub of the green? Yes. But Rosberg is looking more and more like a deserved world champion, as Damon Hill noted this week. Hamilton is renowned as a one-lap king in qualifying but with this latest performance, Rosberg has taken it to eight-eight for the season, while he's only being outscored 31-29 by his team-mate in qualifying during their time together at Mercedes.
It's certainly not over in this title race or this race, in fact in the last three Japanese GPs the man starting second has gone on to win, with Hamilton the beneficiary twice. He now must somehow extract similar levels of grit and pace come lights out.
Turn One could be rather special...
The grid went in two by two...
It's not something we've seen that regularly this season, but there was a distinctive Noah's Ark feel to qualifying at Suzuka, with seven teams coming in two by two.
The top six positions were filled by a pair of Mercedes, followed by Ferrari and then Red Bull while the Williams, Toro Rosso, Sauber and Manor cars will also start side by side on Sunday.
No more than two grid places separate the Force India, Haas, McLaren and Renault drivers and with the majority of teams halting development and switching their focus to 2017, this could well be a pattern we see more of in the closing races of this season.
The home blues continue
What is it about teams struggling at their home races?
Red Bull have never won at the Red Bull Ring, the long straights at Monza aren't getting the most out of Ferrari, while Petronas-sponsored Mercedes' suffered an engine blow-out last weekend in Malaysia. Now, you can add McLaren to that list after their hapless qualifying performance in Honda's backyard.
Fernando Alonso pointed out that McLaren have come a long way since his "GP2 engine" outburst in this race last year, when the team were embarrassed in front of thousands of adoring fans. He may be right, but the facts remain; both Alonso (15th) and Jenson Button (17th) qualified one place higher up here in 2015.
"It's not the right performance in qualifying," Alonso said. "It seems it's a step backwards here."
Vettel in crisis?
Maurizio Arrivabene's comments on how Sebastian Vettel must earn a new Ferrari contract and focus on driving provided us with plenty of pre-qualifying debate, on what is set to be a frustrating weekend for the German.
His three-place grid penalty drops him down to seventh here and, though the Scuderia actually impressed in Saturday's shootout and had the better of Red Bull, Vettel was worryingly out-qualified by team-mate Kimi Raikkonen.
"I'm beginning to think Sebastian Vettel won't be in Formula 1 for the long haul," suggested Sky F1's Martin Brundle. "He came so young, he broke so many records. I just watch him at work and he's lost his mojo."
It's an eye-opening prospect for fans of the four-time world champion and indeed, of Formula 1.
