Planet-F1

Qualifying: Massa takes a Turkish hat-trick

Saturday 10th May 2008

Felipe Massa is in prime position for Sunday's Turkish GP after netting his third successive pole position in Istanbul.

The Brazilian, who won back-to-back Turkish GPs in 2006 and 2007 starting from pole position, put in a phenomically quick 1:27.617 to take the coveted grid slot from Heikki Kovalainen by 0.191s.

It was an upswing in form for the Ferrari driver, who needs this weekend's race to prove he can match his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen. The Finn will start the race P4 on the grid, alongside Lewis Hamilton, who surprisingly opted to put in his final lap on the harder option Bridgestone tyres.

Robert Kubica and Mark Webber completed the top six.

Qualifying Report
The data carefully gathered over three previous Turkish GPs had to be thrown out of the window as a chill wind hit the Istanbul Otodrome with the ambient temperature plunging to16C and the track varying between 26 and 30C.

No SuperAguris had meant a hasty rejigging of qualifying rules with the slowest five cars disappearing after Q1 (as opposed to six) and five eliminated after Q 2 (instead of six). This meant that the likely candidates for dismissal, Force India and Toro Rosso would be joined by at least one car from a mid-grid team.

The chill wind blowing across the circuit had unsettled cars in practice and Mark Webber had suffered an accident in the fearsome Turn 8 corner when he lost control of his Red Bull, though it hadn't stopped him going fastest in morning practice.

Qualifying 1
Giancarlo Fisichella set the first time on hard tyres, a 1:29.273 which was undercut by Timo Glock's Toyota to 1:27.539 followed by 1:27.412 on a successive lap.

Kimi Raikkonen came out relatively early for Ferrari and lowered the P1 time to 1:26.736, which was bettered by McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen with a 1:26.736 and decimated by Lewis Hamilton's first lap of qualifying, a 1:26.192. The self-proclaimed owner of Istanbul, Felipe Massa, could only manage fourth fastest time and to prove his continued ownership went out at the end of the session to set P1 at 1:25.994. Curiously no-one would run quicker after this lap.

Going into the final three minutes of the 20-minute session, the positions at risk were:

12. Button, 13. Vettel, 14. Rosberg, 15. Nakajima, 16. Piquet 17. Bourdais, 18. Barrichello, 19. Sutil, 20. Fisichella

At his 257th World Record GP Rubens looked like going out with a whimper. Out they came again for a final run, all strapping the softer tyre for maximum grip.

Fisichella came across the line in P18 - an improvement but nowehere near enough, Rosberg went 11th, Trulli launched himself up the order to 4th, Vettel grabbed a reasonably safe 14th, Alonso went 9th, Glock an amazing 4th (ahead of team-mate Jarno Trulli!), Rubens achieved safety with 12th, Nakajima couldn't mimic Rosberg's pace and was 16th, Button stayed 14th, but it was Nelson Piquet Junior who lost out by going off track at Turn 10 and staying 17th.

As the dust settled out went:
16.Nakajima
17.Piquet
18.Bourdais
19.Fisichella
20.Sutil

Vettel managed to get ahead of the drivers most likely to take him out on the opening lap of the race, while rookies Nakajima and Piquet will be going closely through the data with their engineers for some time to come.

Qualifying 2
There was a marked reluctance to get out on track in Q2 and there were just 12 minutes left when David Coulthard took his Red Bull out on track. The result was an automatic P1 for DC, which was edged out straight away by Fernando Alonso with a 1:26.522. No messing around for Kimi Raikkonen trying to make the harder tyre work, he put his Ferrari at the top of the timesheets with a 1:26.050 on soft tyres (slower than Massa's Q1 time) which was good enough to take P1 for the whole session. Massa could only manage a 1:26.192 on soft tyres but with the fastest final sector.

Lewis Hamilton could only manage a 1:26.477, for P3, and his second run (later) on soft tyres was no faster. Robert Kubica was only fifth fastest after his first run and would also have to go again.

Coming into the last three minutes the danger zone was: 7.Webber, 8.Trulli, 9.Coulthard, 10. Heidfeld, 11.Barrichello, 12. Rosberg, 13.Vettel, 14.Glock, 15.Button. At the end of the session, the top ten cars would be covered by 0.75 of a second so it was not surprising to see both Mclarens go out again.

Kovalainen led off the last-minute scramble and moved up to P3, Vettel improved to P11, which was a good lap for his car but clearly not enough, Coulthard went P6 and was safe, Kubica shot up to P2, Rosberg jumped to P10 which didn't look enough. Alonso stayed where he was in the top 10, Webber leapt up to P5, Barrichello could only manage P12, Heidfeld improved to P9 and bumped Rosberg out, Button went P13 to prove that he was bat least on a par with his team-mate.

It was down to Timo Glock to jump into the Top 10 with his Toyota - and demote team-mate Jarno Trulli. He couldn't do it and in fact didn't improve his time at all. So out went.11. Rosberg
12.Barrichello
13.Button
14.Vettel
15.Glock

Though Timo ended just five places behind Jarno Trulli, his time was a second slower.

Qualifying 3
Into the final sprint for places and Trulli set the pace with a 1:30.299 on hard tyres, reduced to 1:29.093 by Lewis Hamilton on hard tyres. Felipe Massa quickly showed that he did indeed own Istanbul with a 1:27.896 opening lap for a clear P1. Robert KUbica went P2 but was almost a second slower, Raikkonen put his Ferrari into P2 but he was still half a second shy of his team-mate.

The big surprise was that after the first runs Lewis Hamilton opted to stay on the seemingly slower hard tyres - because he preferred their handling over the course of the lap. Onboard footage had shown the Brit having some pretty lurid moments going through Turn 8 and he felt that the softs went off too quickly before the end of his lap. Team-mate Heikki Kovalainen showed no aversion to softs and strapped the white line tyres on for his final run.

He used them to good affect because he immediately set the P1 time, though the Mclaren mechanics celebrations were muted as Felipe Massa was simultaneously turning the timing screens purple with his final lap.

Massa grabbed pole with an immaculate 1:27.617 demoting Kovalainen to P2 b less than 0.2 of a second and Lewis Hamilton - who had managed to grab the fastest final sector time depite his hard tyres - to P3. Mysteriously Massa's main threat for pole, Kimi Raikkonen, lost a second in his first sector time and had to settle for P4, while Robert Kubica could manage only P5. Mark Webber seemed slightly taken aback to be P6 and with David Coulthard going over a second slower for P10 it was clear that the Red Bull team had decided to split their strategy.

Turkey has a similar reputation to Barcelona for converting poles to race wins - every polesitter has won in