F1-Blog

Qualification

Qualification ended in Imola with a few surprises to mull over. First off (and not really a surprise) Ferrari performed well at their home race with Michael getting his first pole of the season, and Massa finishing the session in fourth.

The one turn up for the books was not the performance of Button in the Honda, or even the Honda in general. No it was the resurrection of Rubens Barrichello's season with his 3rd on the grid.

The other 'not quite expected's' are. Renault - The team certainly did not perform as was expected, as Pat Symonds said "We are either going to go long in the first session, or we are slow". Championship leader Alonso will start from fifth on the grid with Fisichella starting eleventh even though he had an uprated engine available to him.

Toyota definitely performed above their previous attempts, Ralph will start from sixth even though he struggled on Friday with car issues, and Trulli will start from ninth, the first time this season both Toyota cars have been in the final qualifying session.

The two McLaren cars are believed to have been fueled heavy (Ron Dennis said as much after the qualifying session). If the two cars are significantly heavier than those ahead of them, and they don't take each other out at the first corner, then they should be good in the race. Montoya starts seventh one spot ahead of his team mate Raikkonen.

Webber and Rosberg seemed to be struggling at most points of the Saturday session even though they have new Cosworth power and a few aero tweaks on the Williams. Villeneuve did well in the BMW-Sauber plonking himself in twelfth, and nearly half a second quicker than his younger and better thought of (inside the team) team mate Heildfeld who starts from fifteenth.

The other surprise is the Toro Rosso team. Everyone was expecting the V10's torque to be a huge advantage to the team at the very up and down Imola track. I'm not sure what happened but Liuzzi is starting from sixteenth in his home GP and his team mate Speed has only got the four tail enders from the MF1 and Super Aguri teams behind him.