QUALIFYING REPORT
It meant that while the
Mercedes drivers were secure
enough in their times to remain
in the garage as the session
wound down, Verstappen and
Ricciardo went out on soft
tyres, just in case. However, as
the times around them did not
decrease significantly neither
required improvement and they
abandoned their final runs.
Vettel, then, topped the
session ahead of Raikkonen,
Rosberg and Hamilton. Bottas
took P5 ahead of Force
India’s Nico Hulkenberg, while
Romain Grosjean was seventh.
Verstappen took eighth ahead of
Ricciardo and tenth place went to
Felipe Massa.
At the rear of the field,
McLaren’s Jenson Button was
eliminated in P17 ahead of
Renault’s Kevin Magnussen, the
Sauber’s of Marcus Ericsson
and Felipe Nasr and the Manors
of Esteban Ocon and Pascal
Wehrlein.
As has become their
trademark, the Mercedes duo
were immediately out on track
when the lights went green to
signal the start of Q2. The pair
were evenly matched through
the first sector, with Rosberg
only four hundredths of a second
quicker than Hamilton.