It’s been quite a while since we last saw two Ferrari drivers locking out the front row of the grid for a Formula 1 race.
In fact, the last time it happened was way back in 2008 at the French Grand Prix, 166 races ago (to be exact).
Well, that rather unfortunate dry spell of front row lockouts has now ended for Ferrari after qualifying for the Russian GP.
Vettel finished Q3 at the Sochi Autodrom at the top of the timesheets with a 1:33.194, giving Ferrari its first pole position since Singapore 2015.
Even more astonishing is the fact it’s only the fourth non-Mercedes pole of the V6 Turbo era, which started in 2014. It’s also the first non-Mercedes pole since Monaco 2016.
Kimi Raikkonen was second fastest in Q3, putting in a strong banker lap and failing to improve on his last attempt after a few little errors.
But it was still good enough for P2, albeit painfully close to his first pole since France ’08. The gap to Vettel was just 0.059 seconds.
Valtteri Bottas was third fastest and was the lead Silver Arrows, with Lewis Hamilton fourth after being uncharacteristically off the pace.
Ferrari looked strong in practice and topped FP1, FP2 and FP3. But Mercedes looked very good in Q1 and Q2, so it set up a tight fight for pole.
Hamilton’s first Q3 lap was scruffy and his second wasn’t enough to move him up the order, leaving him on the second row.
Daniel Ricciardo, Felipe Massa, Max Verstappen and Nico Hulkenberg were next up. Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon were ninth and 10th for Force India.
It was a pretty exciting and dramatic qualifying hour, all in all, and included a few incidents – including Pascal Wehrlein spinning at Turn 13 and Jolyon Palmer crashing at Turn 4 almost at the same time in Q1. Oops…
Qualifying result
1. Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m33.194s
2. Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 0.059s
3. Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 0.095s
4. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 0.573s
5. Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull 1.711s
6. Felipe Massa Williams 1.916s
7. Max Verstappen Red Bull 1.967s
8. Nico Hulkenberg Renault 2.091s
9. Sergio Perez Force India 2.143s
10. Esteban Ocon Force India 2.236s
11. Lance Stroll Williams 2.770s
12. Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 2.774s
13. Kevin Magnussen Haas 2.823s
14. Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso 2.754s
15. Fernando Alonso McLaren 3.466s
16. Jolyon Palmer Renault 3.268s
17. Pascal Wehrlein Sauber 4.138s
18. Marcus Ericsson Sauber 4.313s
19. Romain Grosjean Haas 4.426s
20. Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren 3.876 (15 place grid penalty)
What are your Russian GP race predictions? Let us know in the comments!
