Lewis Hamilton is acutely aware that he needs to qualify on the front row tomorrow if he is to have the best chance of challenging Sebastian Vettel for victory in Singapore. The Briton was quickest in FP1 but fell a second behind Vettel to finish fourth in FP2 and is looking to improve the balance of his Mercedes ahead of qualifying.
“It wasn’t the perfect Friday for us but we got on with our programme and know where we have to make improvements for tomorrow. The balance of the car felt really good in P1 but it definitely went away from us in P2. There is a lot of work to do this evening but we’re used to that on a Friday night and will just get on with it and focus on our car and performance. It’s so difficult to overtake around at this circuit that you want to qualify as high up as possible and, of course, aim for the front row but that will be tough. The circuit is much improved here without the chicane and Turn 10 feels like a much nicer corner now.”
Teammate Nico Rosberg was third fastest tonight and has stressed that Mercedes must focus on the race with conditions set to push the cars to the limit.
“It’s great to be back in Singapore although the conditions are incredibly hot out there and it’s a tough challenge for the drivers. We had a reasonable day but there is still some work to do this evening as our competitors seem to be very quick again. We will be looking at how we used the tyres this evening and make sure we are on top of potential overheating and degradation on the long runs as there are no long straights here to cool the tyres down.”