Williams Martini Racing F1 Japanese GP qualifying 26.09.2015: Japanese GP Qualifying Notes • Valtteri Bottas qualified third and Felipe Massa fifth

Japanese GP Qualifying Notes




•         Valtteri Bottas qualified third and Felipe Massa fifth for tomorrow’s Japanese Grand Prix.

•         Both cars made it through Q1 on the prime tyre before needing only one option tyre run each in Q2 to safely make it into the top ten shootout. 

•         Neither driver had a chance to improve on their final runs in Q3 as the session was red flagged following an accident for Kvyat.
 


Rob Smedley, Head of Performance Engineering: The important point to make first is that Kvyat is ok, after what was a big accident. Without the red flag we could have taken third and fourth, and that was our target coming into the session. It was a great team effort throughout the whole day and we have a competitive car.


The longer runs look good and we have to convert qualifying into a strong points score over our competitors tomorrow.
 

Valtteri Bottas: I’m really happy to be third again in Suzuka. It has been a good day. We made some changes after FP3 and those changes were exactly what we needed, so as a team we have really performed well. I feel comfortable with the car and around here that is very important


. I enjoyed the session a lot. We have limited data on tyre wear due to the conditions yesterday, but starting third we need to target the podium tomorrow.
 

Felipe Massa: It was a good qualifying where we managed to save a set of tyres for tomorrow. The car was competitive even if I didn’t get to show its full pace due to the red flag in Q3. After such a big accident it’s good to see Daniil jump out of the car.


We have a long race tomorrow which we are looking forward to and I believe we can deliver a strong performance.
 


Track    Suzuka, Japan     Weather    Warm and Dry

Lap Length    5.807kms / 3.608 miles    Temperature    Air: 26-28°C Track: 32-37°C

1.    N. Rosberg    Mercedes    1:33.015 (2nd)    1:32.632 (1st)    1:32.584
2.    L. Hamilton    Mercedes    1:32.844 (1st)    1:32.789 (2nd)    1:32.660


3.    V. Bottas    WILLIAMS MARTINI RACING    1:34.326 (4th)    1:33.416 (5th)    1:33.024
5.    F. Massa    WILLIAMS MARTINI RACING    1:34.744 (10th)    1:33.377 (4th)    1:33.337
                                         
 

Sophie Ogg- photo Williams F1 LAT