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Hamilton Takes Stunning Pole Position

Formula One
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In the dying stages of Q3 Lewis Hamilton put in an amazing lap with a time 1:18.404 to snatch pole position for the Japanese Grand Prix, with Felipe Massa ending up in 5th place on the Grid.

Kimi Raikkonen will sit next to Lewis Hamilton on the grid tomorrow, after taking second place with a time 0.2 seconds slower than Lewis Hamilton.

Rain earlier in the day cleared away to reveal blue sky and gave a drying track as qualifying progressed and track temperatures increased from 22 to 26 degrees, resulting in ever quicker lap times.

Before Hamilton's final Lap, Ferrari had looked to be heading for an all front row. However, in addition to Hamilton, both Kovalainen (3rd) and Alonso (4th) also put in fast laps to put Massa down in a surprising 5th position.

Kubica managed to be 6th fastest and will line up behind Alonso on the Grid.

Toyota have put themselves on 4th row of the grid with Trulli in 7th and Glock in 8th. Behind them will sit the two Torro Rosso's with Vettall in 9th and Bourdaise in 10th.

The drivers to lose out at Q2 were Coulthard (11), Piquet (12), Webber (13), Nakajima (14) and Rosberg (15).

Whilst the first set of drivers to fall victim to Q1 were Heidfeld (16), Barrichello (17), Button (18), Sutil (19) and Fisichella (20).

Qualifying results and times www.pitlanefanatic.com/viewt...

Qualifying as it happened news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/mot...

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posted Oct 11, 2008

comment by xsheikh (U5897984)
posted 5 Minutes Ago

check out this.http://bleacherreport.com/articles/67655-lewis-hamilton-under-investiagtion-for-blocking-in-fuji-qualifying

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Considering that the article provided by the link given ends by saying the investigation was cancelled due to a misunderstanding, a bit of a non-comment!!

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posted Oct 11, 2008

I Think Ferrari has the tactic.Massa first and Raikonnen second it's my prediction.Raikonnen will work for Massa,last year
inverted.
Raikonnen will do everithing to pay back Massa.

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posted Oct 11, 2008

I Think Ferrari has the tactic.Massa first and Raikonnen second it's my prediction.Raikonnen will work for Massa,last year
inverted.
Raikonnen will do everithing to pay back Massa.

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Given KR's comments in the ITV pre-quali interview, he seems to be saying that It is up to Massa to get the job done first, and then he 'will see' whether 'help' is appropriate.. Bearing in mind Massa is behind him, Kimi has first to let Massa pass. As they are not exactly best mates, can't see it somehow!!

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posted Oct 11, 2008

Is everyone forgetting Kubica in 6th, there is a real chance that he could take massa at the start!

Hamilton only has to keep in on the track for a decent result tomorrow, i can't see massa cything through the field.

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posted Oct 11, 2008

I think Lewis will be instructed once again to watch Alonso.

McLaren has adopted a 'new aproach' to racing trying to take maximum points with minimal risks or winning by the minimal margin as Martin Whitmarsh said today.


KR will be allowed to disappear in first place without much of a fight but if FA gets in front of Lewis chances are there is going to be a train of cars behind him and Massa may have a chance to get near Lewis and maybe leapfrog him during the pit stop if he was to carry more fuel than Lewis.


I would expect tomorrow's instructions will be either: a)"Dont panic, specially if Fernando overtakes you, remember what happened to you in Brazil last year" or
b)"Alonso is not to overtake you under no circumstances, we are not racing Massa, we are racing Fernando!"

I think option a) is the wise option but somehow I fear Lewis will choose option b)

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posted Oct 11, 2008

kimi to take LH out the race on first lap,,orders from there man in the pit who has done it to win world title and got away with it!!!

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posted Oct 11, 2008

i think lewis has a good chance of winning but be carefull kimi will do his best to pass him and for sure ferrari has a good plan for massa to catch up with lewis. Once lewis is under pressure from kimi and alonso he will panic and make a mistake and that is where massa will seize the moment . I am backing ferrari all the way , they are the undisputed world champions.

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posted Oct 11, 2008

That's a very easy one to answer, because we have already seen the conclusive evidence on that. Hamilton beat Alonso hands down when they had identical equipment during their season together at McLaren. The pressure was too much for Alonso and the toys came out the pram. This from a rookie driver to F1, getting his first look at most of the tracks against a double World Champion.

How blind do you have to be, to keep omitting these events



sorry but alonso gave the car that extra few tenths and was forced to share his data with lewis (set-up) remind me what happened when lewis didnt have this in italy and spa? he was trounced and had to go back to woking to analyse where he went wrong (commendable) so dont try and act smart with me, alonso was having to unlearn things (bridgestones) and was in a team enviroment which favoured lewis, and was thoroughly unhappy. May i remind you that the best driver this year kubica took a year to get used to the bridgestones and was well and truly beaten by heidfield are you trying to say last year was the only representative year of formula1? kimi, alonso and kubica struggled massively to change their driving styles yet still goldenboy threw away 17 points out of 20. As an aside ferrari have struggled with reliability whereas mcclaren have been superb shame lewis isnt further ahead really. Still there are still two tricky pitlanes left to negotiate to negotiate!

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posted Oct 11, 2008

galaxy man


sorry you are woefully inaccurate about jenson, he is a class driver has for saying dont talk about the car what the hell do you expect, the car is terrible, what do you want him to do win races in it. Dont make me laugh. As for why has he not gone to a bigger team i dont know, he seems to believe honda will come good again. he is also the third highest paid driver on the grid which may be off putting to some teams. the 'drunken lout' slur was pathetic i take it you were refering to his slightly wild days 5 or 6 years ago? so what if he likes the ladies and a good time thats a healthy thing to do, oh wait are you just jealous? grow up!

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posted Oct 11, 2008

shame the end of the season is turning out to be abit of an anti climax

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