The qualifying for the German grand prix held many surprises. One of them was that there was no rain! The forecast said the chance for rain was very high. But instead the whole qualifying session was driven in dry conditions! Which doesn´t mean it´s going to be dry tomorrow when the race takes place...
Personally I didn´t expect much from the McLaren duo on the basis what I had seen at the practice sessions. Their pace seemed very tame and I was sure neither of the McLaren drivers was going to make it to the front row. But when the qualifying got underway, these two appeared to be like from a different planet! Especially Hamilton whose performance was strong indeed. Hamilton seemed to be surprised himself, too when he was told he had grabbed P2!
And who took pole position today... No, it definitely wasn´t Sebastian Vettel in front of his home crowd! It was his team-mate Mark, who has risen to a whole new level after the team order row at the previous race. Mark managed to pull out a superb lap and snatched the pole by only 55 thousandths. Like Mark said after the qualifying, the circuit seems to suit him extremely well. But another noteworthy fact is that in spite of taking three poles during this season Mark hasn´t been able to lead even one lap at the race! Let´s see if he will be able to change that tomorrow... I´m sure Hamilton will try everything he can to overtake Mark at the start!
How about the championship leader Vettel, what happened to him? He ended up 3rd on the grid which is the worst spot on the grid for him during this season! Should we be worried...? I don´t think so. I guess normally many drivers would be extremely satisfied with the 3rd spot. But on the basis what we´ve seen during the first half of the season it´s understandable to feel at least a bit disappointed. Vettel´s superiority has been so scathing that you start to take these pole positions and first-row finishes for granted... Which you shouldn´t do of course!! Neither life nor Formula 1 can be perfect all the time so there are both ups and downs... And I´m sure there has to be downs for superb Vettel aswell. But he´ll fight tomorrow, that´s for sure. And it is extremely healthy to see his team-mate challenging him so strongly. It´s interesting to see what will happen when Vettel is pushed to the limit by his team-mate!
Let´s not forget the Ferrari drivers. Although I predicted it would be Alonso who would challenge the Red Bull drivers for the pole it wasn´t the case. In final standings Alonso was 4th and his team-mate Massa 5th. But the Ferraris will be strong and competitive at the race so there´s going to be an intense battle for the victory I hope!
What is less important maybe but interesting for me as a Finn is the fact that there´re now three F1 drivers with a Finnish physiotherapist. In addition to Vettel also Hamilton and Buemi have Finns as their physios :) So I guess Tommi (Vettel´s physio) has started an interesting trend among the F1 drivers :) Which is kind of flattering and tells a lot about the Finnish expertise in the field!
Tomorrow will be the first day for a loooooong time when I won´t be able to watch the race live on TV! Oh my God, how I´m going to cope with that, hahaha ;) Easily I guess because I´m going to the centre of Helsinki to see the Red Bull Show Run by Kimi Räikkönen and Sebastien Loeb which will take place at the same time with the German GP! I´ve seen Kimi and Loeb driving their WRC cars live last summer at Neste Oil Rally but I´m sure it´s going to be highly emotional for me tomorrow! But that´s going to be a whole new blog post...!
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