World Championship leader Fernando Alonso made it two poles in two races after an impressive performance at a wet Hockenheim.
In the end Alonso set the two fastest times of the day with his last two laps. Although he made it look easy, he insisted it was a tough session.
“I think the problem is that you don’t know the conditions,” said Alonso. “It was similar in Silverstone. You wait five, seven minutes in the garage and then you have completely different grip and completely different standing water in places that you don’t expect.
“So in the out-laps you try to memorise a little bit where the water is and how much to push, to feel a little bit with the car the grip. Then you start opening the lap you go surprise after surprise with the car, having moments everywhere, especially with aquaplaning into Turn Six.
“I think when you have this type of conditions it’s very difficult to put a clean lap together and it’s very easy to finish in the gravel or to finish in the grass, the wall or whatever. So, those type of conditions are a little bit of a survival moment, that you need to finish the qualifying and see afterwards what position you get.
“You try to complete the lap, to avoid any problem, and then whatever the position is, you are happy, because you know you were at the maximum, or you felt that you were at the maximum. So when they tell you, you are on pole, it’s obviously a very happy moment.
“But the race is tomorrow, today was good but we need to concentrate for tomorrow and also look at the sky – because the weather has been so changeable at the moment – yesterday and today – and tomorrow we need to be ready for anything.”
One of the keys to Alonso’s performance today was the decision to pit during Q3 for a fresh set of extreme wets in the search for extra grip in the closing laps.
“I think it was a very good decision in the end, because obviously I didn’t know what timed lap you could do if you kept running but as soon as I put on the second set of tyres, I found a little bit more grip in the car. Also the track was improving obviously, but I think we improved a little bit more thanks to the tyres, not only the track conditions, so I’m happy with the strategy today and I think it was the right call.”
The encouraging thing for both Alonso and his team is that the F2012 has been consistently fast in recent races, in all kinds of circumstances.
“Yeah, the car is performing well in all conditions this weekend, which didn’t always happen: we were quick on inters and not extreme and vice versa, sometimes good on wets and not so competitive on dries but it’s true that this weekend both Felipe and me were happy with the balance of the car and also quite competitive in all conditions, so overall, until now it’s been a very good weekend for us in terms of car performance, but we need to finish the job tomorrow.
“Tomorrow we will try to do our best. Whatever the position will be at the end is difficult to know because we didn’t have enough dry running, I think, to know about degradation, tyre performance etc, because Friday we had some rain in FP1 and this morning in FP3 was not a big preparation for the race either, so tomorrow is a question mark for everybody.
“We will all start the race in the same condition with some things to learn during the race, very open in strategy, very flexible because, as I said, we don’t have enough information from the weekend so far.”
Adam Cooper F1 