Formula 1

Hamilton fastest again

Lewis Hamilton secures Pole Position for the second race of the formula 1 season. Behind him, the other driver of the Mercedes and Ferrari will have to place. A three-way battle is likely to decide the race.

All in
Australia: silver in front of Red, and no additional tension due to the new mode. World champion Lewis Hamilton won in the second Qualifying session after the controversial elimination principle of the first starting position for the Bahrain Grand Prix, his team-mate Nico Rosberg was only the second rank. As at the season opener in Melbourne, the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel and Finn Kimi followed Raikkonen in start number two.

“I had a few problems today with a perfect lap. But when it counted, I was there,” said Hamilton after his 51. Pole. Rosberg took the narrow defeat: “This is the track where Pole Position is perhaps the least important, because there are always close matches.”

Mercedes-Domination

And eternally the Same: Rosberg, Hamilton, Vettel waving

The world champion Team Mercedes underlined its role as a favourite on the race win in the desert. Vettel was already a good five tenths behind Hamilton, who won in Bahrain in 2014 and 2015 won – and then the world title. “I hope that we have a similar good Start in Melbourne,” said Vettel, and practiced optimism. In the season opener, the 28-Year-old was shot to the silver arrows over and lay for a long time on the way to Victory.

Force India driver Nico Hulkenberg was Eighth, but it has to start as a price for its good starting position with used tires – as a ninth he would have been able to under the new regulations, a new set of winding. Pascal Wehrlein secured in the Manor and the remarkable 16. Start place among 22 drivers. “I am very satisfied. And tomorrow it will go forward,” said Wehrlein at the television station RTL.

Ecclestone Criticism

Bernie Ecclestone: “formula 1 is in danger.”

To the test was – as in Melbourne –
the new, highly controversial mode, therefore, of a certain time in the three qualifying sections all of 90 seconds, the Slowest is out. The hoped-for great Action was again strong in the borders, about the Format to be voted on this Sunday. According to the new mode, not the last six, but the last seven drivers will be eliminated after the first section.

Meanwhile, Bernie Ecclestone has once again made it to the Mercedes dominance for the plight of formula 1 are co-responsible. “The Problem we have now, that Mercedes is so good. You qualify as a first and Second and finish the race on one and two,” said the 85-year-old managing Director of the formula 1 on Saturday in the paddock of Bahrain. The Superiority of the Mercedes began with the introduction of the new so-called Power Units, Turbo-engines, with an additional hybrid drive. The new engines in formula 1 would destroy the “slow but sure,” Ecclestone repeated his criticism of the new engines.

ck/og (sid, dpa)