Issue 6 - 2013

The Final Sector
By Kate Hewitt - @kate_hewi
Australian Grand Prix 2013
Wow, what a brilliant start to the Formula One
season! Congratulations to Kimi Raikonnen for
winning, and well done to Fernando Alonso and
Sebastian Vettel for appearing on the podium!
Practice 1, 2 and 3:
First practice started off dry, and sunny, however
practice 3 was due to rain. At the start of P1 it was
Daniel Ricciardo (home crowd) who went out first, to
do his installation laps, he was followed by Romain
Grosjean. Many drivers went wide, but there were no
collisions or much damage, but with just over a
minute to go Paul Di Resta spins off the track. It was
Sebastian Vettel who came out on the top of the
timing sheets, with Felipe Massa shortly behind. In P2
we see Mercedes coming under some problems. First
off Lewis Hamilton spun off the track into the barriers;
the mechanics were sorting out his car through the
night. Then we see Nico Rosberg pulling his car over,
it was a suspected gear-box problem. Hopefully
Mercedes become more reliable over the course of
the season. Un-surprisingly it was yet again
Sebastian Vettel who topped the timing sheet, with
team mate Mark Webber behind. When it came to P3,
rain was due on the radar. Esteban Gutierrez was first
out of the pits, and surprisingly just 8 minutes into the
session, Jenson Button was complaining of tyre
graining. With 40+ minutes to go, it started to rain,
and all cars came into the garage. Martin Whitmash
told SkyF1 that McLaren might not be going back out
in the session, because they might need all the
intermediate tyres during qualifying, later that day.
Just before the rain came, Romain Grosjean was on
top. Yet another problem for Mercedes surfaced, after
Nico Rosberg’s KERS failed. Marussia also had a
problem with Max Chilton’s gear box, as he could not
select first gear. With 15 minutes to go, McLaren had
still not gone out. Drivers started to change from full
wet tyres to intermediates, with 12 minutes till the end
of the session. Then, with just 10 minutes to go, a car
stopped at turn 4. This time, it wasn’t a Mercedes, it
was the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel, due to a
possible hydraulic problem. Romain Grosjean topped
the time sheet this time, with Fernando Alonso in
second.
Qualifying:
I was one of many fans who had pulled an all-nighter
for this event. Many in which became angered by the
fact that Q2 got postponed. Especially because Q1
had already had us waiting an extra half hour.
However, having said this, qualifying was extremely
exciting. The good thing about wet weather qualifying
is you can see the best drivers really show off what
they can do. When Q1 finally started, it was both the
Mercedes drivers who went out first to wait by the red
light, and then other cars started to pile up behind
them. Giedo Van der Garde was the first of several
drivers to get caught out by the weather, after clipping
the barrier at turn 5, he had damage to his front wing.
Shortly after, Lewis Hamilton slid on the black line at
the exit of turn 2, and just clipped the barrier. At first it
looked like he had beached his car in the grass,
however he hit reverse and was shortly free. He
received damage to his rear wing endplate, but carried
on going despite his team telling him to pit to change it.
With just 11 minutes to go, another driver getting
caught out in the weather was Felipe Massa. He span
off and clipped the barrier, however he didn’t come off
as well as he had lost his front wing. Just behind Felipe
at this time we see Mark Webber going wide, and
having to go over the grass. 7 minutes to go, Sergio
Perez slides off the track and narrowly misses hitting
anything. 4 minutes to go, drivers started to pit for
intermediate tyres. 1 minute to go, Charles Pic hit’s the
barrier but limps back to the pit, however on the same
lap Esteban Gutierrez clips the slippery black line and
spins into the barrier, he wasn’t so lucky as his car
stopped on the track, creating a yellow flag zone. All
cars doing a hot lap would have to slow down. Nico
Rosberg was the man on the move the whole session,
not getting caught out once; he ended the session in
P1. The drivers eliminated were Maldonado, Gutierrez,
Bianchi, Chilton, Van der Garde and Pic. When Q2
restarted late into the night, we see both Toro Rosso’s
head down to the pit exit, however they would be
waiting for 3+ minutes. A while after this, they were
joined by both Mercedes, and all cars are on the
intermediate tyres. For the whole session the top place
spot was switching from both Sebastian Vettel and
Nico Rosberg, but it was again Nico Rosberg who
ended up on top. The drivers eliminated were
Hulkenberg, Sutil, Vergne, Ricciardo, Perez and
Bottas. During this session Jenson Button, Sergio
Perez and Jean-Eric Vergne all tried using the super
soft tyres, this proved costly for Sergio as he was
slipping everywhere, he then pitted for hot super tyres.
Whereas Button realised this was the wrong tyre, and
pitted for inters. Vergne also did the same, but it was
too little too late, and the pace he had throughout Q1
seemed to disappear. Q3 was the most exciting. Were
we going to get a damaged car, were we going to see
something unexpected, and more importantly who will
come out on pole? When the green light was shown,
Nico Rosberg was the first out, followed by his team