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Welcome to our coverage from the Saturday of the Australian Grand Prix. We will be here all day while we will also be chatting and answering your questions here |
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The good news and the bad. The weather should be fine for FP3 with temperatures hovering around 67 °F/19°C but it is downhill thereafter and it's more than likely there will be showers on and off by the time we get round to Qualifying |
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So let's begin the build-up to final practice in earnest with half an hour to go until the final hour ahead of qualifying. You'll have noticed we're back on our usual commentary layout - we do plan on running the more interactive version this season but as you've seen with McLaren yesterday; it can take a while to get the most out of new parts! So far now if you want to get in touch with your questions and comments then you can email us using the link above |
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Whether or not you were following our live coverage yesterday, everyone could do with a recap of what happened in FP2, and it was a familiar name that was on top... |
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Our first email of the day comes in from Jim in Perth who says: "Just reading your welcome to Albert Park - does the deteriorating weather suggest a wet race for tomorrow? Then again, as you know with Melbourne, if you don't like the weather, just wait 5 minutes! "Meanwhile I'd love to see Mark win his home GP. As a West Aussie, I'd be even happier if Daniel could do so, but you gotta be realistic...." |
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It might well indeed, Jim. There's a 60% chance of rain today and a further 20% chance of showers tomorrow, but that's a figure that keeps changing throughout the weekend |
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There's another way you can all follow the goings-on at Melbourne today too, and that's via our Twitter feed. Laurence is in the paddock and will be bringing you the latest news and colour, so make sure you're following @ESPNF1 |
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Altaf asks: "Is lotus running DDRS this weekend !!! Pace looks very strong !!!!!" Not that we've seen so far this weekend. The air intakes are on the car but blocked up, so the team clearly hasn't given up on the concept but isn't ready to use it yet either |
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The biggest news from yesterday was that Mercedes seems to be genuinely quick and McLaren genuinely slow. Martin Whitmarsh went as far as to say the team is "undoubtedly struggling" and it will be looking to find some kind of set-up direction with its car in this hour |
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In other news, I've just had a chat with Laurence and here's one of the things you don't see behind the scenes: "There is a lovely coffee lady handing out free cups of proper espresso-style coffee at the paddock gates. Had a quick chat with her and she's already pissed off with the egos floating around the paddock. Says she doesn't give f*** if someone is a CEO, they don't deserve a coffee any quicker than anyone else. More power to her. "And her lattes are doing wonders for my jet lag" |
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Two minutes until the green light and the dark clouds are gathering. In fact, the sun has disappeared for now... |
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Laurence: " There was also a strong trade in rain ponchos at the paddock gates this morning. $5 for a piece of plastic! But a good investment having just looked at the clouds coming in from the east." |
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Dave emails in to ask: "Hi, Do you think that Alonso has influenced engineers to go "pull rod" after his personal liking of this design at Minardi ? It appeared that last year he was pretty quick to get the feel, where as Massa took most of the season to get to grips. If this is the case that it has distinctive handling qualities, then could this be Jenson & Sergio's problem with the cars handling at the moment." It might be something that Alonso was in support of, but the Ferrari engineers will be the ones that made that call for aerodynamic reasons. I don't believe it's the sole cause of McLaren's lack of pace, but it will be one of the reasons that it is on the back foot at this stage |
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Note from the FIA to the teams saying telemetary link between race control and cars is down due to reliability problems. It means no cockpit lights for flags and the FIA can't control the DRS from race control and will mean the teams will have to do it. Teams/drivers will do it manually |
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Times immediately. Webber is fastest with a 1:31.171 |
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Robert in Darwin asks: "Do you think we will be expecting rain during the qualifying session?" Definitely. The sky is very dark overhead already and I'd be surprised if we don't get any rain in this session as well! |
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Button complains of understeer and graining already after just three laps on a set of medium tyres |
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Alonso goes quickest with a 1:27.537 |
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Sauber convinced it's about to rain and telling Gutierrez to get on with his run quickly. You can visibly see the rain falling in the distance |
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Massa goes ahead of Alonso with a 1:27.407 |
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Kevin emails in to ask: "Do you think Lotus has improved over last year? And who looks to be leading the midfield?" Yes, it looks like Lotus is even closer to the front than it ended 2012, but whether it can maintain that all year is the tough question. As for leading the midfield, I was expecting it to be Williams but I think it's looking like being Sauber now |
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Pic switching to options already as Caterham expects the rain to hit within ten minutes. Very dark now |
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Alonso is fastest again with a 1:27.000 |
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Grosjean goes fastest with a 1:26.929 |
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Webber told: "OK Mark we expect rain in the next two or three minutes, it will get to turn 16 first" |
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Too late that call - it is raining heavily in the pit lane |
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Hamilton pits having yet to set a time. Chilton, Bottas and Maldonado also didn't get any running on the slicks |
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The two slowest times set are Button and Perez: both over six seconds off the pace. McLaren says they are "not representative times" |
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Needless to say, the track is empty now as a result of the rain. Webber has completed the most laps with 10 - the only man in double figures |
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Fewest laps are one for Chilton, two for Bottas and three for Maldonado and Hamilton |
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The big issue here is that nobody got in any super soft running before the rain fell. In one sense, the teams won't mind too much if it's a wet qualifying as a result |
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Now, we had a blog post from Kate Walker earlier this week that caused a bit of a stir. Her tongue-in-cheek piece started with "Welcome to Australia. Everything here wants to kill you." Well, as it turns out, she wasn't far off as this fella crawled up the leg of a Lotus mechanic this morning... |
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Martin Whitmarsh tells Sky he doesn't expect to see anyone running in these conditions because of the expected wet qualifying: "You only get four sets of intermediates and our simulations suggest you'll need all of those for qualifying" |
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It is still raining and still very dark. It was a proper downpour the way it came in |
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Half of the session still to go. The teams aren't being boring by staying in the pits - aside from saving tyres they're also saving the cars. One spin in the wet could result in a lot of damage... |
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Marussia explains why Chilton only completed one lap of running before the rain: "Max was unable to select first gear so we've addressed that during the downpour & fingers crossed for when the track action resumes" |
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Robert asks: "Can't the FIA red flag for practice 3 cause of the rain? I'm pretty sure they did this last year in Malaysia? But I think it was during qualifying?" As practice doesn't decide the grid or race result, it doesn't get red flagged. The race can be postponed under a red flag due to rain though |
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Massa's on track! |
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Caught me out there, Massa decided to go out on full wets to check out the conditions |
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Vettel watching what Massa is doing on the TV with his engineer Rocky. Massa continues to start a second lap and picks his way through the leaves which have blown on to the track |
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Oh it's all happening now. Alonso joins his team-mate on track, with both Toro Rossos and Saubers out there too |
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Sutil and Grosjean take to the track too |
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The golden rule right now: don't bin it |
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Gutierrez runs slightly wide in to turn one. With more cars on track now the spray is pretty bad too |
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Only Alonso, Vettel and Button not on track at present |
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Gutierrez catching some oversteer in turn one while Massa wrestles with his Ferrari. Bianchi runs wide at turn one too. I repeat: Don't bin it! |
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Deepraj asks: "Is qualifying also going to be wet?? And where are the mercs???" Yes we expect to see showers during qualifying (although we thought FP3 would stay dry, so make of that what you will). Both Mercedes are on track but Hamilton didn't set a dry time. Rosberg was 11th after one timed lap on slicks |
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We have lap times from everyone now, but the bottom four were all set on full wets. Hamilton does a 1:47.246 which puts him six seconds clear of Bottas, seven of Maldonado and 11 of Chilton |
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Track is starting to clear of standing water and I'd say it's time for intermediates |
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Track is clear again. Odd. We had that earlier too and I wonder if it was as a result of the FIA testing its telemetry problem... (see here) |
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Bottas runs wide at the penultimate corner and pits. Vettel is on the intermediate tyres now |
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Hmmm... Vettel came out of turn three and pulled quickly to the right and parked the car safely. Clearly a problem. |
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Vettel's radio: "Do not shift, we've lost hydraulics. Do not shift, stop the car on track" |
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Track is clear again with eight minutes to go |
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Button complains the balance is too far forward on his car and that he needs to pit |
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Vettel has returned to the paddock. I'm not sure whether Red Bull will be more concerned about Vettel's hydraulic failure or the fact that the car will be easy to photograph where it is... |
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The track is looking very dry in certain places now, thought still wet off-line |
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Rosberg told: "OK Nico we're close to a dry changeover now so don't damage these tyres we need them for qualifying" |
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Van der Garde skips across the grass at turn one |
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Maldonado pushing on the intermediate tyres. Hulkenberg doing the same and he runs wide at the high-speed turn 12 but saves it |
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Maldonado improves to a 1:39.232 on the intermediates |
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Webber out of his car, as are both McLaren drivers |
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Sutil using DRS down the pit straight despite DRS being disabled... He could get a slapped wrist for that one as the FIA can't disable it automatically |
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The FIA deploys the Safety Car to try and test its systems which it is having problems with |
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So it's actually Grosjean who was fastest in FP3 ahead of Alonso and Massa, but we can't read in to the times due to the changeable conditions. We can read in to Vettel's stoppage, though. Red Bull will be working to sort the hydraulics issue during the two hours it now has ahead of qualifying |
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So, things not going smoothly for the world champion and race favourite. Laurence is filing the report as we speak, to keep an eye out on the site for that, and we'll be back with all the build-up to qualifying in 90 minutes' time. Bye for now. |
Green light and Esteban Gutierrez is first out on track
A long yellow flag but no sign of why yet...
Chequered flag is out and that's the end of practice/testing/hiding pace. The next time we see these cars will be qualifying, when - as Vettel put it last year - everyone pulls their pants down and shows what they've got
