Hamilton's mistake hands pole to Rosberg

Lewis Hamilton had been fastest this year with two pole positions and one win. The other race ie. the opening Australian Grand Prix was an aberration as Hamilton had a failure. However, in Bahrain, at a crucial moment Lewis Hamilton made a mistake as a result his teammate Nico Rosberg grabbed the pole.

Hamilton will start besides his teammate in P2.

In what was seen as the signs to come, in Q1 everyone except the two Mercedes cars and Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull were in softer tyres as these three knew their pace. In the Q3, it was proved right with Daniel Ricciardo scoring a P3. However, he will be demoted 10 places due to the grid penalty he earned during Malaysian Grand Prix.

In Q1 apart from the regular backbenchers Caterham and Marussia, Adrian Sutil of Sauber scored a P18. There was stiff competition between the two Lotus cars to move into Q2 and Romain Grosjean could pip his team mate Pastor Maldonado by a slender margin to move into Q2. Grosjean scored 1m 36.654’ vs Maldonado’s 1m 36.663s.

One big casualty of Q2 was reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull who failed to qualify to Q1. He could only manage P11. Vettel scored 1m 34.985s and Kimi Raikkonen just beat him to the P10 position in Q2 with a time of 1m 34.925s. Daniel Ricciardo has twice beaten Sebastian Vettel in the last three qualifyings and Vettel must be hurting a lot.

Valtteri Bottas of Williams was a surprise as he qualified in P4 where as his teammate Felipe Massa was P8. Both of them will start at P3 and P7 respectively following Ricciardo’s grid penalty.

Another surprise was Sergio Perez of Force India who qualified in P5. He will start at P4 along side Bottas in the second row.

Kimi Raikkonen outqualified his teammate for the first time in three qualifyings. Kimi scored P6 and will start at P5. Jenson Button of McLaren was behind Kimi at P7. He will start at P6. Button’s teammate Magnussen scored P9 and will start at P8. Fernando Alonso was the 10th among the Q3 participants. He will start the race at 9th position. Vettel will be along side him.

Bahrain F1 Qualifying standings

Sl. No.             Driver             Team

1.         Nico Rosberg              Mercedes

2.         Lewis Hamilton          Mercedes

3.         Daniel Ricciardo        Red Bull

4.         Valtteri Bottas            Williams

5.         Sergio Perez               Force India

6.         Kimi Raikkonen         Ferrari

7.         Jenson Button            McLaren

8.         Felipe Massa              Williams

9.         Kevin Magnussen     McLaren

10.       Fernando Alonso       Ferrari

11.       Sebastian Vettel        Red Bull

12.       Nico Hulkenberg       Force India

13.       D Kvyat                      Toro Rosso

14.       Jean-Eric Vergne       Toro Rosso

15.       Esteban Gutierrez     Sauber

16.       Romain Grosjean       Lotus

17.       Pastor Maldonado     Lotus

18.       Adrian Sutil                Sauber

19.       Kamui Kobayashi      Caterham

20.       Jules Bianchi              Marussia

21.       M. Ericsson                 Caterham

22.       Max Chilton               Marussia