Formula 1

Australian GP: Bridgestone qualifying report

Red Bull Racing driver Sebastian Vettel powered to pole using Bridgestone's soft compound tyre to set a new lap record pole time of 1m 23.919secs around Albert Park for the Australian Grand Prix. Vettel has team-mate Mark Webber alongside him for ...

Edited: Mar 31, 2010, 1:48 AM

Copy link

Share on Facebook

Share on Twitter

Share on WhatsApp

Share on Linkedin

Share on Pinterest

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

Red Bull Racing driver Sebastian Vettel powered to pole using Bridgestone's soft compound tyre to set a new lap record pole time of 1m 23.919secs around Albert Park for the Australian Grand Prix.

Vettel has team-mate Mark Webber alongside him for tomorrow's afternoon race start. Local hero Webber was fastest in the earlier practice session using the soft compound for a 1min 24.719secs.

Q&A with Hirohide Hamashima - Bridgestone Director of Motorsport Tyre Development

What was significant about today's running?

"Qualifying was a good battle with very close times and Sebastian Vettel did a very good job to take pole. There is an interesting line-up in the top ten so there is good potential for tomorrow's race. The temperatures today were a lot cooler than yesterday, which presented a challenge for drivers, especially in qualifying. Qualifying was interesting as different strategies were used because of the threat of rain."

What are the tyre strategy considerations for tomorrow's race?

"Track condition will play a large part. The track was quite green at the start of today, because of the rain last night. If there is rain before tomorrow's race we will face quite a difficult track, and those starting on the soft tyre will have the concern of graining on the left tyres, either front, rear, or both depending on the car and set-up. If a driver can protect their tyres then a one stop strategy should be possible, and the lower pit lane speed limit we have here also plays to this approach. The soft tyre is around 0.5 seconds faster for its fastest lap than the harder tyre, but we really don't have sufficient data to know how long it will last here. This, and the variable of the Melbourne weather, will be the biggest unknowns for tomorrow's race."

-source: bridgestone

We want your opinion!

What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?

Take our 5 minute survey.

- The Motorsport.com Team

Read and post comments

Read also :

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Facebook

Share on Twitter

Share on WhatsApp

Share on Linkedin

Share on Pinterest

Share on Viber

Previous article Vettel leads Red Bull 1-2 qualifying in Australia

Next article Even more Saturday news briefs from Melbourne

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

View More & Comment

More from

Sebastian Vettel



Why Daniel Ricciardo would consider a comeback at Le Mans

WEC

WEC

Why Daniel Ricciardo would consider a comeback at Le Mans



Sebastian Vettel reveals why BMW didn't want him – but Red Bull did

Formula 1

Formula 1

Sebastian Vettel reveals why BMW didn't want him – but Red Bull did



The deeper meaning of Vettel’s emotional Schumacher demo run at Monza

Formula 1

Italian GP

The deeper meaning of Vettel’s emotional Schumacher demo run at Monza

More from

Red Bull Racing



How Max Verstappen beat Red Bull's own simulation tools with P2 in Brazil

Formula 1

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

1 h

How Max Verstappen beat Red Bull's own simulation tools with P2 in Brazil



How Lando Norris prevailed in a swift errors tour of Interlagos

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

How Lando Norris prevailed in a swift errors tour of Interlagos



Max Verstappen "needs to understand what happened" after "night and day" F1 comeback in Brazilian GP

Formula 1

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

14 h

Max Verstappen "needs to understand what happened" after "night and day" F1 comeback in Brazilian GP

Latest news



Aprilia: “Marco Bezzecchi couldn’t avoid the collision; Marc Marquez moved in on him"

MotoGP

MGP MotoGP

Qatar GP

15 min

Aprilia: “Marco Bezzecchi couldn’t avoid the collision; Marc Marquez moved in on him"



How the Racing Bulls pendulum is swinging back towards undeniable Liam Lawson

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

58 min

How the Racing Bulls pendulum is swinging back towards undeniable Liam Lawson



Brazilian Grand Prix Driver Ratings 2026

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

Brazilian Grand Prix Driver Ratings 2026



How Max Verstappen beat Red Bull's own simulation tools with P2 in Brazil

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

1 h

How Max Verstappen beat Red Bull's own simulation tools with P2 in Brazil

Feature

Discover prime content



How Formula 1 proved the naysayers wrong – for once

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

By Stuart Codling

How Formula 1 proved the naysayers wrong – for once



How Lando Norris prevailed in a swift errors tour of Interlagos

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

By Stuart Codling

How Lando Norris prevailed in a swift errors tour of Interlagos



"He really wanted it" – why Russell was furious over aborted Brazil ‘pole’ lap

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

By Stuart Codling

"He really wanted it" – why Russell was furious over aborted Brazil ‘pole’ lap



What we learned from Friday practice at the 2026 Brazilian GP

Formula 1

Sao Paulo GP

By Jake Boxall-Legge

What we learned from Friday practice at the 2026 Brazilian GP

Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.

From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.

You have 2 options:

Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here

Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page

Manage Alerts

Subscribe