It was hard not to be pessimistic about the chances of a competitive Italian Grand Prix on Friday when the other 18 cars in the field were struggling to get within a second of the dominant Mercedes-GP cars.
There is always big support and expectation on the Ferrari team at their home race and on Saturday that was no different with the grandstands at Monza packed and full of the team’s flags and banners.
Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen were nowhere near the pace of Lewis Hamilton in the first two practice sessions, with Vettel’s fastest time eight tenths off a second slower, and Raikkonen 1.1 secs down.
But clearly Ferrari’s engineers found something overnight as the pair were much closer to Hamilton in final practice, and Vettel got to within two tenths of Hamilton.
Ferrari maintained that speed into qualifying, and while they were not able to prevent Hamilton claiming the 48th pole position of his career, they did manage to split the Mercedes cars for the first time since the Bahrain Grand Prix in April – seven races ago.
Raikkonen was 0.234 secs off Hamilton’s time of 1 minute, 23.397 seconds to claim his first front-row start of the season as he went fractionally faster than Vettel, edging out the German by just 0.054 secs.
It was an impressive effort, given that the track is dominated by long straights with 76 per cent of the 5.7-kilometre lap spent on full throttle. This is a race where a strong engine is crucial.
Unsurprisingly, Mercedes and the teams supplied by them have been the ones coming to the fore, but for Ferrari to be legitimately so close to Hamilton is a victory in its own right. It gives hope they can continue to close the gap and fans may have closer racing at the front towards the end of the season and into 2016.
Their efforts relegated Nico Rosberg to fourth place in the second Mercedes, the German’s worst qualifying performance since the Chinese Grand Prix in 2014, and appeared to have dented his title hopes.
He trails Hamilton by 28 points in the drivers’ standings, but he may still receive some inadvertent help by Ferrari, who will fancy their chances of causing Hamilton problems on Sunday, if they can get ahead of him at the start.
That is a realistic possibility given the fact the Ferraris have usually been good off the line this year, and Hamilton’s getaways have been poor in recent races.
Hamilton has failed to convert pole into the lead at three of the past four races, and while he did lead away in Belgium two weeks ago, his start was slow but was aided by cars around him that made even worse ones.
Also in his memory will be his awful start last year, when he fell from first to fifth in a matter of seconds, although the positive for him was he was still able to fight back and finish first.
Getting their noses in front on Lap 1 in Hungary was how Vettel and Ferrari won, and either Ferrari will be in a strong position if they can get ahead of Hamilton.
The Mercedes has the speed edge, but as has been shown this year, they have found it difficult to overtake on track when stuck behind slower cars.
Hamilton was a second a lap faster than Vettel in Barcelona in May when he was behind him but had to rely on pit stops to get ahead. In Belgium, Rosberg did his passing in the pitlane to get from fourth to second after a slow start.
Vettel was calm on Ferrari’s chances, however, as he said: “We need to be realistic. It’s going to be a tough race.
“Those guys (Mercedes) have some serious pace in the race, as we’ve found out many times this year.”
Hamilton was unsurprisingly confident of his prospects of a third win in four years at Monza and a seventh of the season.
The Briton said Saturday: “Our race pace has tended to be quite strong, so I hope we see that tomorrow.”
gcaygill@thenational.ae
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