UpdateF1 >> Formula 1 News > Massa masters Marina park

Ferrari McLaren front row

From the moment the lights came on here at Singapore on Friday evening, bathing the superb Marina Park street circuit in a stunning and beautiful light, we knew we were in for a treat.

That it came with a quite scintillating qualifying session bodes well for tomorrow, when the winners and losers of the three timed sections take their places on the grid for the 800th world championship grand prix.

Session one went with few surprises as Kimi Raikkonen took the fastest time ahead of the McLaren pair of Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton, and his Ferrari team mate Felipe Massa, while at the back we lost the two Force India cars – Giancarlo Fisichella after he hit the wall when he finally got out for a run, his crew having toiled since the earlier session to fix a car that had been in the wall then, too – and the Honda of an out of sorts Rubens Barrichello who was never on the pace of his team mate Jenson Button all weekend.

Also out went Sebastien Bourdais in the STR, from whom we had expected more, and Nelson Piquet in the Renault, ditto.

The second session proved excitement a-plenty as Lewis Hamilton made an absolute hash of his first effort. By this time the Ferrari duo were up ahead, followed by the incredible Sebastian Vettel in the STR, and with Kovalainen safely mixed up amongst them. Felipe Mass had looked particularly assured this session, taking top spot with a lap of 1:44.014 – there was more to come from him, as we would see in a few minutes time.

Hamilton, meanwhile, was having a difficult time of things as his only lap put him eighth with seconds to go. We had lost – unfortunately – Fernando Alonso in the second Renault by the time, the blue and yellow car slowing to halt with a malfunction in the fuel system, robbing Alonso of what was surely a top four starting position, and proving strangely fortuitous for young Hamilton in the process.

With Hamilton precarious in eight, first Timo Glock – superb in the Toyota here – and Kazuki Nakajima in the Williams jumped ahead of the McLaren, who now sat in tenth place, on the verge of an abyss, with other cars behind him having laps to complete.

The dangers were Jenson Button and Mark Webber, and both were on laps that, by the second split point, were enough to relegate Hamilton to the back half of the grid. Both, somehow, contrived to run poor final sectors, and thus Hamilton was safe and dry.

It was a thrilling few minutes, and a representation of just how exciting Formula One can be.

The final top ten settled down with the two Ferraris and McLaren’s, plus the BMW pair of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld, both slightly off the ultimate pace here, and for the first time this year both Williams cars, Nico Rosberg having looked like a safe bet all weekend and joining his team mate Nakajima in the final section, with the excellent young German pair of Glock and Vettel making up the ten.

The first runs provided as surprise as although the front three were Ferrari and McLaren, Kovalainen suddenly seemed to lack any pace at all and could only manage tenth. He would recover in the next effort, however, and secured fifth position right at the end.

The interest was up front, however, as first Raikkonen took pole, then Hamilton, and then we watched in awe as the timing screens turned purple each time the number two Ferrari crossed a split point.

Felipe Mass stormed across the line over six tenths of a second – that’s a lifetime in F1 terms – quicker than second place man Hamilton, and even if there is a fuel imbalance, it will have to be a very big one to make such a difference.

The suspicion is, my man in Singapore tells me, that Massa is running lighter – considerably so – than the next three cars, which points to a three stop strategy from the pole man, against two from the challengers.

Raikkonen will be joined by the Kubica BMW on row two, Kovalainen by the Heidfeld version on row three, and Vettel and Glock will line up on row four ahead of an all Williams fifth row of Rosberg and Nakajima.

Alonso starts a disappointed 15th, but the threat of rain still looms, and its anybody’s guess what may happen tomorrow.

Written: Sat, 27 Sep 2008 15:27:30