But title leader "full of optimism" ahead of Sunday's race
Sunday 21 September 2014 09:34, UK
Nico Rosberg rightly measured Lewis Hamilton’s superiority during qualifying for the Singapore GP at just seven-thousandths of a second but the title leader is optimistic he can turn the tables in Sunday’s race.
Two weeks after Hamilton pressured his Mercedes team-mate into a mistake that cost him victory in Italy, Rosberg was looking to hit back with pole position under the lights at the Marina Bay Circuit.
Rosberg briefly snatched provisional pole from Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo but in a tight session – just 0.3s separated the top six – the eventual gap to Hamilton was a meagre 0.007s.
The German’s initial reaction – a cry of ‘Damn it!’ over the radio – betrayed his disappointment but Rosberg denied the suggestion that outqualifying Hamilton would have represented a particular psychological blow in his favour.
“I don’t think of it as bouncing back from Monza or from previous races. For me, I’m looking at today and today Lewis did a seven-thousandths better job than me,” Rosberg said.
“Of course, it was very, very annoying because seven-thousandths, you think, ‘Damn it! That last corner I could easily have done seven-thousandths better’.
“So initially it was very annoying but afterwards I could live with it. It’s second place there’s still a great chance in the race.
“For me it’s in the past and I’m optimistic now for tomorrow. Full of optimism.”
Hamilton and Rosberg may have secured a front-row lock-out but Mercedes’ rivals were right on their pace throughout and even quicker at times.
Ferrari pair Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso ended Q1 on top, with Rosberg suggesting that rear tyre wear might be limiting Mercedes’ pace over a single lap this weekend.
“Singapore is a very unique track and the overheating of the tyres was at its highest today, compared to a lot of other tracks – the supersoft tyre and the conditions out there,” he explained.
“You have a sequence of so many corners. On the straights you must cool them down but here you have one corner and the next corner and short straights.
“That is compounding overheating them. If you then have a car that just causes a little bit less of that overheating then all of a sudden you see very big differences.
“That could be one reason other teams are closer: maybe we’re heating the tyres a bit more.”
Rosberg also said that rear tyre wear could be the limiting factor in the race but is confident Mercedes won’t struggle more than their rivals.
Another factor might be the thunderstorm that arrived late on Saturday night, washing away rubber laid down during qualifying.
“Rear tyre wear is going to be a big thing in the race. I had a good long run on Friday so I was comfortable with it but with the rain it brings a bit of an unknown,” he added.
“We don’t really know how the track’s going to be but it could be more of a problem than we’ve seen on Friday, especially now with very heavy rain.”
The 2014 Singapore GP is live only on Sky Sports F1 this weekend. Our race-day coverage begins at 11.30am on Sunday with lights out at Marina Bay at 1pm.
