Odd quali. Light rain at the beginning meant slippery painted lines and an almost phantom slippery section that sent a lot of cars into the gravel due to losing traction on throttle. LeClerc didn't make it out of Q1! He said later he thought there was something wrong with the car because he had problems into left-handers (on a "right-hand," or clockwise, circuit). Perez, Russell out in Q2. Alonso scuffed his floor in the gravel which compromised his Q3 (to the extent that Stroll outqualified him). Lewis was nine tenths off Max after their first Q3 laps (which drew a rueful smile from Toto). Max ended up over four tenths clear of P2, and he was a tenth and a half up when he bailed on his second Q3 lap because he didn't need it. Gasly (P4!) outqualified Ocon. I chalked all this up to slick tires in overcast, slightly damp conditions being a bit of a lottery.
Then I saw
Peter Windsor's quali summary and he had an interesting observation (hypothesis may be uncharitable considering how long he's been around F1). He said he noticed Max extending (not shortening or driving optimally) T3 yesterday, and he thought it was to overexert the tires (which are on the harder end of the Pirelli spectrum) to put some heat into them, which then helped him with grip on rest of the lap. Lando said in his post-quali interview that McLaren seem to go well in these conditions, and that could be that the car tends to overheat the tire (which usually means better quali/one-lap but worse race/long-run pace). Windsor said Carlos' and Lando's less efficient cornering style meant more tire scrub and temp which explained their better performance today, and that he noticed in Monaco that Lewis seemed to drive the updated Merc more aggressively, which may be why he outperformed George today. (George said his car was bottoming in places it wasn't earlier in practice, but it's unclear if that's because of a setup change or because of low tire temp and thus maybe pressure and diameter thus insufficient ride height in high-speed corners, but what do I know about racing. Almost everyone was complaining about bouncing/porpoising in the last two corners in FP1, though, even Red Bull, so teams started their cars too low.)
I think Ocon said he made a mistake in T10 in his last Q3 lap, so maybe I can't read too much into Gasly's racing style from his outqualifying Ocon. Lewis also said he made a mistake in T10 which cost him P2. Checo lost it in I think T7, a medium 90º left-hander, which I thought was because he put his car too far onto the paint but could be because his generally smooth driving style ("tire whisperer") meant lower tire temps and less grip, particularly on the less-stressed right hand tires. Windsor thought LeClerc's clinical driving style may have meant under-temp tires, which may explain his problem with left-hand turns. Or maybe he just has a cracked chassis.
Windsor talks about the Rob Wilson the driver coach. Wilson said Kimi Raikkonen was a natural in his style of creating a neutral platform before turn in via the brakes. Stroll was a student of Wilson's. Stroll is also generally good in the rain, presumably because of this. So did Stroll outqualify Alonso today just because Alonso had floor damage, or did he (wisely) ignore some of Wilson's teaching and scrub some heat into his tires? Maybe he's finally over his bike crash and getting to grips with the car, seeing as
he matched Alonso in Q1 and Q2.
Gasly got
two separate three-place grid penalties for impeding, which dropped him from P4 to P10.
IIRC, Sainz and Norris did the same times they did in Q2 in Q3, 1:12.7s. Max did a 12.7 in Q2 and dialed that up to a 12.2 that could have been a 12.0 in Q3. A Red Bull was probably going to be on pole anyway, but Max is obviously as good at wringing the neck of a car in quali as he is at being easy on the tires in the race. Not every driver seems to master both (e.g., Perez the human traction control able to extend tire stints in the race but not the fastest over a single lap).
Found this Le Mans highlight video and seems it was quite the eventful race!
