- Singapore GP - Qualifying
Rosberg rues 'nothing' gap
Nico Rosberg admits he could not quite believe the slender margin of Lewis Hamilton's pole after being pipped by just 0.007s in Singapore.
Rosberg lost out to Hamilton despite being quicker in Q2, though he required two runs to get there while his title rival stayed in the pits and saved a set of tyres. Hamilton and Rosberg were sixth and seventh after their first runs in Q3 but the German rose to provisional pole on a used set of super-softs as the clock expired, only to be knocked down by his team-mate's own attempt.
When told Hamilton had beaten him to pole by 0.007s, Rosberg shouted "damn it!" on the radio, which he says shows how frustrated he was to miss out by so little.
"Seven thousandths [of a second], when I think back to the lap, it's nothing," Rosberg said. "It's just a little bit here or there that could have done it, but that's the way it is. Lewis did a good job to get pole, so fair play and second place is okay. It's a long race ahead and it's fine."
Rosberg admits a chance in brake specification before qualifying put him off his stride, though he says it started to come together in time for his final run.
"We changed brakes ahead of qualifying and I'd got into rhythm with the other brakes so that was a challenge and we expected it to be. The balance also wasn't very good because the track had cooled down, so relative to the session before qualifying when it was hotter, there was a lot more understeer and the rear has a lot more grip. I had to completely adapt the settings to get it through qualifying, but in the end I was able to push flat out and put in a good lap time."
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