F1 Silverstone Quali

Welcome to the new look Silverstone and the now long term home of the British Grand Prix after all the talk about it moving to Donnington during 2009. The battle up front is building as Red Bull, Mclaren, Ferrari and Renault all seem to be closing up.

The new Loop section will have the effect of bunching the cars up during the race which should be more exciting during the race. The usual protagonists are up at the sharp end as usual headed by Sebastian in Q1 but there is a long time to go yet during through Q2 & 3.

So we lost the usual cars after Q1 with Jaime in seventeenth followed by Heikki, Timo, Jarno, Pedro, Karun and newcomer for this race only Sanho Yamamoto replacing Bruno Senna in the second .

Into the second fifteen minutes of Q2 Michael was down in fifteenth and just on the bubble so we will have to see whether the Mercedes is any better as the weekend develops. I still think we are all expecting maybe too much in his comeback after three years away as the development of the cars is so much further advanced.

A lot of the cars have the new blown diffuser including Williams, Mclaren and it will be interesting to see whether Mercedes have mastered the concept after the problems it caused them in Valencia. One has to say the Red Bull's look might quick at this stage during Q2 and as Martin comments it is their race to lose.

Jenson seems to be struggling with rear grip which is a disaster at Silverstone and even Lewis is eight tenths off the pace of Mark. A lot of the cars are being affected by gusting side winds which shows just how much the cars performance can be changed.

Williams are doing well with particularly Rubens who is currently running in sixth. The big surprise is Jenson hasn't made Q3 and finished only fourteenth. So out went Adrian, Jamui, Nico H, Jenson, Vitantonio, Sebastien B and finally Vitaly.

So we have the main cars up at the sharp end but Mclaren are not performing as they should albeit Lewis is in the top few. Jenson said his car is undriveable even without the blown diffuser and they have taken off the upgrades as they are simply not working even though Gary Paffit spent all night on the simulator back at Woking.

Into Q3 they all launched and Lewis went out on the softer Green walled tyres. On his first run Mark became the first driver into the 1.29's only to be usurped by Sebastian only a few tenths quicker. Fernando took third, Lewis fourth after the first run followed by Nico, Rubens and Felipe.

Renault are still struggling with only Robert in Q3 while Sebastian once again took pole beating Mark and another Red Bull lock out on the front row followed by Fernando, Lewis, Nico, Robert who did a better lap in Q3, Felipe, Rubens, Pedro and in tenth Michael in the second Michael.

So an interesting qualifying and it looks well set up for tomorrow but the Red Bull's are mighty.