"Cato Batista" 05/10/2013 3:12:52 ID #495
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Red Bull´s superiority from Singapore is clearly not as overwhelming in Yeongam, something to do with the difficulty of finding the right amount of downforce that is needed for the 3 very different sectors of the track. Sector one is very fast with long straights, sector two resembles the more conventional flowing fast corners of traditional circuits, and sector 3 comprises lots of tight turns between walls resembling a street circuit. As a result Mercedes is fastest in the first sector, Lotus in the second and Red Bull in the third.

The tyre situation looks like this: The option super-soft is about 1 sec faster than the prime medium compound for QF trim; both tyres showed good durability and low degradation rates (advantage Mercedes). On long run performance there is very little between the two which points to a possible 2-stops for race day.

To summarize: Mercedes has the edge in single lap speed, Lotus with its new long wheel base chassis has the best tyre management and average lap times on long runs, and Red Bull is right behind in both departments. Ferrari? they are out of the picture at the moment, although their long-run sequences suggest they can be in contention comes race day. Right now they don’t have the car to qualify near the front.

FP results:

P1 -HAM (1.39.630) VET WEB ROS BUT ALO GRO RAI PER MAS

P2- HAM (1.38.673) VET ROS WEB MAS GRO ALO RAI BUT SUT



Raikkonen registered the only accident of consideration at the end of P1, his car was repaired just in time for P2. The Finn still complains of back pain and he concedes that could be a factor during the race. But as some CFA members pointed out, if his unpaid salary arrives in time like in Singapore the pain just may go away…

The poleman has never won in the past 3 editions of this GP (Vettel twice from 2nd in the grid, Alonso from 3rd) Of the 13 races of this season the pole sitter has won 6 times; Mercedes has been on pole 8 times this season, Vettel the remaining 5.

There is a lot of interesting information in the Comments section of our website, actually everything is there! (great work Santi) both in English & Spanish. Come check it out.


The best QF marks so far this season still belong to Manbos and I with 13 points each, that’s one QF point per race! No doubt our worst year ever, and we have only a few names to play with!

Let’s give it our best shot:

Cato – HAM VET ROS

Good luck