Rosberg seeks to ‘kick-start’ season from Bahrain pole

F1 News

Date: 20/April/2013

Nico Rosberg hopes to put a miserable start to the 2013 season behind him after claiming a surprise pole position for Sunday’s Bahrain F1 Grand Prix.

Rosberg has retired from two of the opening three races and finished a controversial fourth in the other, after being instructed to stay behind team-mate Lewis Hamilton.

With Hamilton starting first at the previous Shanghai event, Rosberg handed Mercedes back-to-back poles by holding off Red Bull’s reigning triple Champion Sebastian Vettel by 0.254s. Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso starts third.

“I really want to kick-start my season,” said Rosberg, who has finished on the podium just once since his debut victory at Shanghai last year. “It’s really been a rough ride in the first three races.

“For sure the competition is going to be tough. Difficult to say if we have enough pace to win the race tomorrow, but for sure we’re going to try and I look forward to starting first.”

As ever, tyre strategy will be crucial to Sunday’s outcome.

“To be honest with you, I don’t know how many stops we have to do,” claimed Vettel. “One stop is impossible for everybody, two stops is impossible for most and then it’s between three and four stops.”

Hamilton qualified fourth fastest, but picked up a five-place grid penalty after a tyre problem in practice caused gearbox damage, moving Felipe Massa alongside team-mate Alonso.

Unlike Alonso, Massa will be starting on the harder tyre.

“Hopefully we can both do a good start and hopefully - with these different strategies - we can cover some more scenarios in the race, than would be in our control if we had the same tyres,” said Alonso.

“I’m extremely happy with our strategy and I’m extremely happy that we’re third and fourth. Tomorrow, we both need to think about being on the podium. It will be really important for the constructors’ championship as well.”

Red Bull’s Mark Webber drops from fifth to seventh on the grid due to a penalty for a collision in China. The Australian will start alongside a disappointed Kimi Raikkonen, currently second in the Championship and fastest for Lotus during Friday practice.