F1: Rosberg storms to his maiden pole

Mercedes takes front row as Schumacher also impresses.

SHANGHAI:

Mercedes were celebrating their first front-row lock-out since 1955 and driver Nico Rosberg's maiden pole position, on a day of firsts in Shanghai.

Rosberg described it as ‘a very special day’ after he demolished the field to take pole for today’s Chinese Grand Prix with teammate and fellow German Michael Schumacher third-fastest but takes second on the grid. McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, who was second fastest in qualifying, already knew he would be hit with a five-place penalty for a gearbox infraction, making it a Mercedes one-two.

"Firstly it was a strange feeling because I was watching the end of Q3 from the FIA garage as we decided to save a set of option tyres for the race, and I couldn't do anything but watch," said Rosberg. "Seeing that I finished at the top of the timesheets and with half a second in hand made me the happiest man today.

“I will enjoy starting next to Michael, which is also very special to me."

Vettel starts 11th

Red Bull were struggling to replicate the dominance of previous seasons after two-time reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel failed to make the third qualifying round and will start 11th.

This time last year the 24-year-old German had won both the opening races and hardly looked back after that as he and his Red Bull car obliterated the opposition. But after two years of superiority, Vettel finds himself in the unfamiliar position of playing catch-up already, as his patchy season reached a new low in Shanghai.

Vettel denied it was tough adjusting going from the clear champion to what would appear, two races in, to be a season of relative struggle.

"Even if you have the best car you never really think about that, you try to improve with what you have,” said Vettel. “For now there's nothing wrong. We know we are not where we want to be. Probably we are not there in terms of the competitiveness that we had last year, no doubt, but we need to work and improve the car, that's the only way to come back.”

Alonso laments 'difficult' qualifying

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso admitted it was another ‘difficult’ session as his cumbersome F2012 disappointed once more.

The two-time world champion has made no secret of his much-maligned car's limitations, which Ferrari felt were even more exposed by the long straights in Shanghai. Alonso will start today’s race in ninth, while teammate Felipe Massa was 12th fastest.

"We knew this would be difficult qualifying and that's how it turned out," said Alonso.

"The car is what it is and the improvements we brought here are not enough to produce a jump in performance, and so this position corresponds more or less to our current potential.”

Published in The Express Tribune, April 15^th, 2012.