F1 Turkey Quali

Well here we are at Istanbul Park for the Turkish Grand Prix. With its 5.33km lap and 14 corners Istanbul Park has a total race length of 309.396km's.

The lap record is held by Montoya from as far back as 2005 which shows the difference in speeds as in 2009 the pole lap is 1.28.316 by Sebastian Vettel. Istanbul Park is an anti-clockwise circuit like Brazil giving the neck muscles a real pounding. After Monaco the teams and drivers look forward to stretching their legs back to a normal weekend.

So, 12 o'clock UK time quali began with a flurry of drivers hoping to get into the top 15 but as usual a top name went. As with Monaco, but for different reasons Lewis just hasn't got the car beneath him to put in the times. Mclaren are simply going to have to find grip from somewhere as the car looks very unstable and back end happy.

I believe Lewis is lacking confidence in the car and one cannot blame him, it is a beast. The usual protagonists were at the sharp end with Ferrari now beginning to mix it with Brawn, Red Bull and Williams. Nico hit the front for a time followed by Nakajima but status quo soon followed.

Sutil got through into Q2 dropping the luckless Lewis down into 16th which shows just how bad the Mclaren is. Piquet complained of no brakes, which could be a problem in one of these rocket ships and finished in the gravel, so his day was done. So after quali 1 we lost Lewis, Nelson, Sebastien (Buemi), Fisi and Sebastien (Bourdais). It appears you would have an advantage with a name such as Sebastien's and certainly at Red Bull / Torro Rosso!

Off into Quali 2 and the front 6 were fighting cat and dog at the sharp end, swopping places throughout the session. Trulli, who has always been a one lap specialist shot in a surprise by taking P1 but was soon to be overhauled by the top 6 but there or thereabouts. The BMW's were shaping a little better with Robert always ahead of Nick.

Jarno's lap put him into P2 at the end of the only topped by Sebastian (Vettel) followed by the 2 Brawn's, what's new. Heikki was shaping up only a little better than Lewis and finished Q2 in 14th place so the 2 Mclaren's will be behind each other on the grid. What they can do from there is really in the hands of the other drivers.

So we lost Adrian (Sutil), Heikki, Timo, Kajuki and Nick in his BMW. With little surprise we had the 10 to go through to Q3 and battle was to commence. Q3 didn't create much drama and not many were getting Green sectors due to the fuel levels now in the cars set for the race. Sebastian, Jenson, Rubens, Mark and Jarno were trading places throughout the 15 minute session.

Mark had come alight and headed the field, then it was Rubens, then Jenson and he must have thought he had it but he had not accounted for Sebastian who was on a charge and pipped him by a mere 100th of a second.

So we have a Red Bull, Brawn front row and finishing positions were Sebastian (Red Bull), Jenson (Brawn), Rubens (Brawn), Mark (Red Bull), Kimi (Ferrari), Felipe (Ferrari), Fernando (Renault), Nico (Williams) and finally Robert in his BMW.

So the Kers cars are back in the field and shouldn't worry the 4 away from the start and one would have to put money on Sebastian hitting the first corner first. However, it is always difficult until we know what fuel levels are in the cars and one has to say the Brawn's are usually supreme in race pace.

Let's hope we have a thriller.