Motorsports Mondial

Photo: AP

Lewis Hamilton comes out of his shell and takes pole in Korea!

The world champion settles for second and focuses on the race.

Button and Webber take up the second row.

Hamilton: “I am happy. I am very happy I am happy to be here and very proud of what the team have been able to achieve over the course of the last few races and for Jenson to have won the last race and us to be on front two rows again and us the only ones able to compete with Red Bull.

I am very happy. But tomorrow is what counts.

It is probably one of the first positives I have had a for a while, so to be back on pole is a great feeling of course.

But tomorrow is the most important day. We had some difficult races in the past, so hopefully I’ll try to redeem myself tomorrow and as long as we can get some strong points for the team as they have worked hard. I hope tomorrow me and Jenson can repay them.”

Vettel: “To be honest I think McLaren was very very competitive yesterday,” said Vettel. “I know conditions were completely different, but you can see they were a fair chunk ahead of everyone else – as well as this morning in the dry.

Once again, we pushed them very, very hard in qualifying and got very close, closer than probably they expected and closer than we expected so we did a very good job in qualifying.

We saved all our prime tyres which will be crucial tomorrow.

It’s not a long way down to the first corner and Turn 3 is a little bit exposed. It’s a long race, lots of things can happen. Tyre wear is crucial and Jenson did a good race last race, so that will be important tomorrow.”

 

Pos Driver Team Time Gap 
 1.  Lewis Hamilton        McLaren-Mercedes     1m35.820s
 2.  Sebastian Vettel      Red Bull-Renault     1m36.042s  + 0.222
 3.  Jenson Button         McLaren-Mercedes     1m36.126s  + 0.306
 4.  Mark Webber           Red Bull-Renault     1m36.468s  + 0.648
 5.  Felipe Massa          Ferrari              1m36.831s  + 1.011
 6.  Fernando Alonso       Ferrari              1m36.980s  + 1.160
 7.  Nico Rosberg          Mercedes             1m37.754s  + 1.934
 8.  Vitaly Petrov         Renault              1m38.124s  + 2.304
 9.  Paul di Resta         Force India-Mercedes no time
10.  Adrian Sutil          Force India-Mercedes no time
Q2 cut-off time: 1m38.254s Gap **
11.  Jaime Alguersuari     Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m38.315s   + 1.789
12.  Michael Schumacher    Mercedes             1m38.354s   + 1.828
13.  Sebastien Buemi       Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m38.508s   + 1.982
14.  Kamui Kobayashi       Sauber-Ferrari       1m38.775s   + 2.249
15.  Bruno Senna           Renault              1m38.791s   + 2.265
16.  Pastor Maldonado      Williams-Cosworth    1m39.189s   + 2.663
17.  Sergio Perez          Sauber-Ferrari       1m39.443s   + 2.917
Q1 cut-off time: 1m39.464s Gap *
18.  Rubens Barrichello    Williams-Cosworth    1m39.538s   + 2.013
19.  Heikki Kovalainen     Lotus-Renault        1m40.522s   + 2.997
20.  Jarno Trulli          Lotus-Renault        1m41.101s   + 3.576
21.  Timo Glock            Virgin-Cosworth      1m42.091s   + 4.566
22.  Jerome D'Ambrosio     Virgin-Cosworth      1m43.483s   + 5.958
23.  Tonio Liuzzi          HRT-Cosworth         1m43.758s   + 6.233
24.  Daniel Ricciardo      HRT-Cosworth         no time