2023 Aston Martin | Aramco | Cognizant F1 Team

[selvam_e2002]

What the heck happened? Easy P2 got slipped away. This was great opportunity for alonso to open up gap to perez and make it into a title fight. Somehow fernando does not max out like others in Q3. If he wants to fight for championship he needs to bring extra tenths

The issue was that for the final runs in Q3, there was no time for a prep lap. For the rest of qualifying, everyone was just pounding in laps on the same set. For final q3 runs when the fastest times were set, it was done with just an outlap

They all fueled for the first run to end as the rain was forecast to come. So everyone boxed with 4min left.

Then when coming out again there was time only for the outlap into push lap. This took things towards Merc who could fire the tyres up quicker. Might punish em tomorrow

Alonso has a momentum in S1, when I watched his onboard camera. he corrected his steering not sure what it was. He could be P3. The race is tomorrow.

I think we will see interesting first corner action from Mercedes guys with Max.

Alonso will sit calm and gain places. Still Podium possible. Let see.

[AR3-GP]

Shame about P4, Mercs look pretty quick as well. Reminds me of Bahrain a bit, starting behind both of them, but I hope Fernando can pass both tomorrow on race pace and hopefully get P2

With the Aston's low top speed, it will be an uphill battle.

[Chanman141]

I was hoping we’d be further up the road, tbh the gap to Ver is expected, Merc came out of nowhere though

[KimiRai]

Fernando: "The best qualy out of the three so far. Mercedes who say that their car is so bad and want to abandon it truth is they are fast, and by middle of the season they may be able to win races.
Hards were going worse than expected but if tomorrow there is sun it may be able to help the hards.
Redbull is still another league but there's only one this time so we have to take advantage, but Mercedes are ahead of us, so it will be an interesting race"

What happened with Leclerc? He was behind Stroll and Sainz so he likely made a mistake

[organic]

He still sounds quite confident. I guess he relishes the battle with Hamilton and Mercedes. It will hopefully be a thrilling race

[mendis]

A bit of an underperformance in Q3. Hope Alonso can jump atleast one Merc and make a race from there to 2nd or even for a win. The strategy team need to be sharp and alert as Alert Park offers SC opportunities which has altered race winners in the past.

[KimiRai]

A bit of an underperformance in Q3. Hope Alonso can jump atleast one Merc and make a race from there to 2nd or even for a win.

Unless Max's car explodes there's not going to be a fight for the win. I think some people here are overestimating the Aston. It may be due to them running slightly lighter on Fridays and people see Fernando 1st.

[Bisonas]

At this point, if it's not going to rain on Sunday (as it seems), i guess Alonso and the Team prefer a sunny Sunday with temps as high as possible, than a cloudy Sunday with temps as low as possible. Lower temps seems to bring Mercedes closer to AMR in one lap pace, and probably in race pace also. Higher temps IMO will make the fight with MERC and Ferrari easier for AMR. All in all, i think in a normal race without issues Alonso will be able to clear the MERCs with the help of his race pace, his tyre deg & some good strategy calls. He just needs to be careful and avoid contacts in the first 2 laps. It's very easy to have some contact or a trip on the gravel in 1st lap in Melbourne. Extra caution is necessary.

[Alo_Fan]

Shame about P4, Mercs look pretty quick as well. Reminds me of Bahrain a bit, starting behind both of them, but I hope Fernando can pass both tomorrow on race pace and hopefully get P2

With the Aston's low top speed, it will be an uphill battle.

Maybe an undercut or take at least Hamilton on the start?

[AR3-GP]

Shame about P4, Mercs look pretty quick as well. Reminds me of Bahrain a bit, starting behind both of them, but I hope Fernando can pass both tomorrow on race pace and hopefully get P2

With the Aston's low top speed, it will be an uphill battle.

Maybe an undercut or take at least Hamilton on the start?

It's all possible. 4 DRS zones. He will have chances but it won't be as easy as driving another car. Think like Bahrain when he said he couldn't overtake on the straights so he had to do it into T11 where nobody does it.

[zoroastar]

A bit of an underperformance in Q3. Hope Alonso can jump atleast one Merc and make a race from there to 2nd or even for a win.

There's not going to be a title fight. No upgrades in 3 races and whole team needs to move to the new factory which will take quite a bit of time in May.

Unless Max's car explodes there's not going to be a fight for the win. I think some people here are overestimating the Aston. It may be due to them running slightly lighter on Fridays and people see Fernando 1st.

haha dude your comments are depressing. keep your head up.

[zoroastar]

if alonso had time to do another warm up lap he could have easily gotten past hamilton, and probably russell with a solid lap. it just didnt work out in their favor today... its a long race though.

[KimiRai]

haha dude your comments are depressing. keep your head up.

Yea hahaha sorry. I just keep my expectations in check so I don't get any negative surprises, its okay.

Hopefully the track is not as cold tomorrow, that should play into the strengths

[KimiRai]

Mercedes apparently only has a 2 kph advantage in the speed trap so it's not that bad.

[selvam_e2002]

are we going to get any upgrade on Baku? I believe AMR running same car for all 3 races without any update.