2016 CHINESE GRAND PRIX EDITION
The extra time didn ’ t help Hamilton , however . After the session restarted he emerged for a last-gasp attempt to set a time , but again the effort ended in failure and he returned to the garage , for good this time . With Wehrlein and Hamilton out , the remaining four elimination spots were filled by Manor ’ s Rio Haryanto , Renault ’ s Jolyon Palmer , Haas ’ Esteban Gutiérrez and the second Renault of Kevin Magnussen .
Q2 saw Rosberg out on track early , but with the German on soft tyres , compared with the supersofts preferred by his rivals . He jumped to the top of the timesheet with a lap of 1:36.240 and , as the session unfolded , his time began to look more and more secure . The German was eclipsed by the Ferraris of Kimi Räikkönen and Sebastian Vettel but Rosberg still cruised through to Q3 on the harder tyre . That now becomes his starting tyre , a strategy that could give him a significant advantage in the race .
His passage through to the final segment was eased by the fact that , as Q2 wound down , Nico Hülkenberg ’ s Force India shed its front left wheel and he ground to a halt at Turn 10 . The incident brought out the red flags again and with just 1m17s on the clock the segment would not be restarted . The bulk of the field were on an outlap at the time , and thus were denied the opportunity to improve their times . After the session Hülkenberg received a three place grid penalty , his team found guilty of an unsafe release .
And so to Q3 . Rosberg now bolted on supsoft tyres for a straight fight and with his opening lap he took provisional pole with a lap of 1:36.111 .
Daniel Ricciardo then made a surprise claim for a top three starting spot , with a time of 1:36.423 . It handed him P2 but he was then pushed back by Räikkönen who put in a good lap to steal P1 with a time of 1:35.972 .
Sebastian Vettel though sat out the opening exchanges , saving a set of supersofts for the race in the expectation that the track would improve in the final run . Rosberg , though , had other ideas and with an early final run he set his rivals a tough target – lapping in 1:35.402 .
In the end it was Ricciardo who went closest to denying the German a second Chinese GP pole . The Australian jumped to P2 with a time of 1:35.917 and when Räikkönen made a mistake on his final run and Vettel failed to find the necessary pace with his solitary effort , Rosberg ’ s work was done .
GPI