Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/286290
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 30 MARCH 2014 57 FORMULA 1 SNOOKER Sport Qualifying - Hamilton storms to wet-weather pole in Malaysia MERCEDES' Lewis Hamilton raced to his second straight pole position of the 2014 season and his 33rd overall in a rain-delayed qualifying session in Sepang yes- terday. With heav y rain making condi- tions treacherous, it was Hamil- ton who came to the fore, produc- ing a scintillating lap to edge Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel for P1 and pull level with the great Jim Clark as Britain's best qualifier. The rain began falling heavily around 35 minutes before the start of qualifying, and so it was no sur- prise when the scheduled start of Q1 at 16.00 was initially delayed 15 minutes, and then again in 15- minute chunks, until conditions were finally deemed acceptable for a start at 16.50. As the two Mer- cedes led the field out of the pit lane, further rain was expected. After their problems on Sat- urday morning in FP3, McLaren gambled on full wet tyres, but that soon proved to be a mistake and both Jenson Button and Kevin Magnussen rushed into the pits for intermediates. Up front Nico Rosberg edged out team mate Hamilton with 1m 57.183s to 1m 57.202s. Vettel, meanwhile, did well to jump up to third on 1m 57.654s, once a car problem was fixed by a systems re- set in the pits. As the rain picked up, Pastor Maldonado was the first one to fail to make Q2, lapping his Lotus in 2m 02.074s. Adrian Sutil strug- gled to 18th in the Sauber on 2m 02.131s, with Jules Bianchi twitch- ing his way round in 2m 02.702s for Marussia. Kamui Kobayashi struggled to 2m 03.595s for Cat- erham as Max Chilton's efforts yielded 2m 04.388s in the second Marussia. Marcus Ericsson's at- tempt to improve on 2m 04.407s in the second Caterham ended when he spun into the barriers before collecting an advertising hoard- ing, bringing out the red f lag with 35s seconds of the session left to run. The Swede was unharmed though his car suffered frontal damage. The rain continued to fall in between sessions, but Q2 went ahead and this time everyone bar the Ferrari pair of Kimi Raik- konen and Fernando Alonso and Williams' Valtteri Bottas went for wets. That was the wrong choice, and when Alonso collided with Daniil Kvyat at Turn 9 while in- bound for a tyre change, the ses- sion was red f lagged so that debris from the Toro Rosso's displaced front wing could be cleared away. The Spaniard's left front suspen- sion was damaged as he clashed with the Russian, but a great effort by Ferrari got him out moments after the session resumed at 17.26 after a six-minute stoppage. Bot- tas boldly stayed on inters before changing to wets. This time Hamilton was fast- est on 1m 59.041s from Vettel on 1m 59.399s and Rosberg on 1m 59.445s, while further back the shoot-out for 10th saw Sauber's Es- teban Gutierrez (2m 02.369s) and Kvyat (2m 02.351s) disappointed as Jean-Eric Vergne grabbed the crucial place with 2m 02.096s in the other Toro Rosso. That was a tantalising two-thousandths of a second off Magnussen, who just made Q3 after spinning into the gravel at Turn 15. As Kvyat thus took 11th and Gu- tierrez 12th, Felipe Massa was only 13th for Williams on 2m 02.460s from Sergio Perez's Force India on 2m 02.511s and Bottas on 2m 02.756s. Romain Grosjean at least got Lotus through to Q2, but spun trying to better 2m 02.885s. In the final shoot-out, McLaren again gambled, but Magnussen soon reported that it was too wet for intermediates. Button, how- ever, stayed on them. That was to prove unwise. Raikkonen set the initial pace for Ferrari with 2m 01.218s but Hamilton soon beat that with 1m 59.431s which would prove good enough for the pole as conditions worsened a little. Rosberg moved to second with 2m 00.180s be- fore Vettel moved ahead of him with 1m 59.486s. The two leading positions thus settled, the focus turned to the fight between Alon- so and Rosberg for third as they both switched, like Raikkonen and Hamilton, to new wets. The Span- iard appeared to have got the job done with 2m 00.175s, but right at the end the German edged back ahead with 2m 00.050s. Fifth place went to Daniel Ric- ciardo on 2m 00.541s in the sec- ond Red Bull, as Raikkonen slipped back to sixth. Nico Hulkenberg again starred for Force India with 2m 01.712s for seventh, as Mag- nussen made the best of a messy day with 2m 02.213s for eighth. Vergne continued his good work with 2m 03.078s for ninth for Toro Rosso, with the unhappy Button doomed to 10th place from the start, unable to better 2m 04.053s as the crossover point for interme- diates never came. After qualifying the stewards de- termined that Bottas had impeded Ricciardo during Q2 and handed the Williams driver a three-place grid penalty. The grid will line up thus: Hamilton, Vettel; Rosberg, Alonso; Ricciardo, Raikkonen; Hulkenberg, Magnussen; Vergne, Button; Kvyat, Gutierrez; Massa, Perez; Grosjean, Maldonado; Su- til, Bottas; Bianchi, Kobayashi; Chilton, Ericsson. (L to R): Nico Rosberg (GER) Mercedes AMG F1, pole sitter Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Mercedes AMG F1 and Sebastian Vettel (GER) Red Bull Racing celebrate in parc ferme Alex Borg and Duncan Bezzina crowned 2014 European Mens Team Champions THE Maltese team of Alex Borg and Duncan Bezzina were crowned the 2014 European Mens Team Champi- ons here in Bucharest tonight after they beat England's Nick Jennings and Calum Downing 4-2 in the final. Malta had been in mixed for during the early part of this tournament with two losses in the group stages to Bulgaria and Germany in early matches but still quali- fied in second place behind the Welsh second team af- ter they beat Wales 3-2. Both players were however scoring heav y in the early matches so when it came to the business end of the tournament they saw off Romania 4 in the Last 24 stage before winning a superb 4-3 match against Wales 1 of Lee Walker and Rhydian Richards to reach the quarters. A quarter final win over on the on form Irish team of Goggins and Devaney set up a semi final clash with Poland who they beat 4-2 to reach todays final. The final itself could not have started any better for them as Bezzina beat Jennings well in the first frame and Borg had breaks of 62 and 52 to give them a 2-0 lead. Jennings and Downing took the Scotch Doubles frame to get them back into the match and Downing then leveled the scores beating Bezzina 60-40 in the next. Borg however won the next frame with a great 42 on the black and the last doubles frame was Malta all the way as they closed it out for a 4-2 victory and claim the title. Alex Borg and Duncan Bezzina celebrating their victory