Wondering what F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone thinks about the new qualifying format, and whether it worked? Autosport's Ian Parkes has managed to speakto Ecclestone, who is not in Australia, and this is what he had to say: "It was pretty crap. But this is what we've got, until we can change it," he said. "I watched it, but I have to say I wasn't enthusiastic about it from day one. "The only thing about this [format] is that the quick guys could have run off the road, or done anything a little bit silly, and then you would get a mixed-up grid, which is what we wanted. "It just happens that Mercedes are still very, very good." That just about sums up the amount of thought that went in- mixing up the Mercedes. Hate his denials about him never wanting these changes when surely he effectively sanctions them?
So Mercedes are 8 tenths faster then. Even worse than I thought. Congratulations Hamilton on the title. Let the dreaming about 2017 begin.
I'm not sure Ferrari are as far away as it seems, they had quite a messy session, hopefully race pace will be closer. Lauda said 0.2, this gap was 0.8 - I think 0.5 is probably fair and half that in the race hopefully.
Talking about something slightly different that Quali. Does Hamilton need those glasses, or is he wearing them for fashion?
Quicker than 2004's pole time, still half a second shy of 2011. It's the race where they're going to look tragic though.
Quali disastrous. Q2 showed big gap. Q3 was not even any effort. P3 had 0.3 second gap which I thought was real but then we had thus strange qualI. Was it ultimate from either ferrari or Mercedes? I dunno. Race will tell us all we need to know.
please log in to view this image Feeling much more confident for a good race tomorrow, thanks Fernando.
What a blistering lap from Hertfordshire boy, smashing all of Schumi's lap times of 2004 with a V6 compared to Von Schumi's V10. Only Vettel has gone faster at Albert park with the 2.4 V8 Newey Slingshot which was the RB7. Lewis in the same car would destroy these two just as he has been doing to the quickest German on the grid in the last three years.
