Red, White and Black At Indy
Qualifying for the American Grand Prix took place today and threw up a number of suprises.
The first came in session 1 as Canadian GP winner Blake Haswell stopped halfway around the circuit with a mechanical problem on his out lap, Blake would no longer take any action, the same fortune struck Renault driver Duncan Hutchison who's Renault never left the garage after the mechanics fround a crack in a piston after Friday's practice. So 2 high profile names went out in a matter of minutes, this gave some rookies a chance to shine and make it into session 2. One of these was Bob Smith in the BMW Sauber, who took the final advancing position of 15th. At the top end of the leaderboard, it was Renault's Carl Audet fastest with Midland's Nathan Soyfu second and Lee Davidson in the Honda 3rd. Dropping out along with Haswell and Hutchison was Machiels, Travis who's pace continued to lack infront of his home crowd and Steve West in the Toro Rosso.
The second session saw Midland continue their impressive pace with Soyfu taking the fastest time, now breaking into the 1'09's. Pianelli took a suprising second in the Williams with Audet still hanging on in 3rd, the session was red flagged with 2 minutes to go however when Joe Blow lost his Williams at the final corner with the side of the car taking the most impact, Joe suffered a slight concussion, he has yet to be confirmed for the race. 2 big names from last week's GP, Simon Trendell and Ashley Butler were suprisingly knocked out in 13th and 14th respectively, also dropping was Smith (15th), Groper (12th) and of course the unfortunate Blow (11th).
The final session was full of uncertainty with both Midlands on the pace aswell as Audet, Davidson, Pianelli and Beyens all setting respectable times. As the times started to get towards competitive figures, Beyens took his Ferrari super wide at the final turn of what was a very fast lap and was lucky to not follow Blow into the wall, he finished the lap and it would eventually give him 4th place on the grid. Elsewhere Honda driver Lee Davidson, making it into the final session for the first time since Monaco, had a huge moment at the first corner with a minute left on the clock, his chance had gone and he netted a dissapointing 8th place. Audet in the Renault didn't fair much better, it was a clean lap but also a slow one compared to earlier times, it could be due to fuel or tyres, either way he took home 6th place on the grid. Surpassing expectations were Red Bull Racing who got both cars into the top ten, with Lewis in a spectacular 5th place and Bond in 7th, wether they are light fueled is yet to be seen. So it was down to Marc Pianelli and the 2 Midlands of Horton and Soyfu, Pianelli, obviously still annoyed of his exit in the last gp thanks to Horton gave it his all and set a personal best of 1'09.899. The challenged was layed. Horton was first to cross the line and he obliterated the American's lap with his own personal best of a 1'09.551, 3 tenths faster than the Williams. It appeared as that would be the pole time before Nathan Soyfu, after the time had finished, went into the final corner, he carried so much pace int othe corner that the back end wiggled out a bit, however it wouldn't stop the American and to the delight of the home crowd he beat his Australian team mate by 8 thousandths of a second. The delight of Nathan was obvious as he lept out of his car, he will be starting on the all Midland front row, in first, at Indy.
I will, it's a good laugh.
