Sebastian Vettel was quickest again in the final practice session for the Singapore Grand Prix.
He set a best time of 1’47.947 ten minutes before the end of the session, which none of his rivals were able to beat.
Lewis Hamilton came closest, falling short by a third of a second. Fernando Alonso was third-quickest, another three-tenths of a second behind.
There were five different cars in the top five with Nico Hulkenberg’s Force India followed by Kimi Raikkonen’s Lotus.
The session came to an early end after Vitaly Petrov crashed at turn 21, breaking the right-rear suspension on his Caterham and spinning to a halt at the pit lane entrance. That brought out the red flags.
Two other drivers had already made less serious contract with the barriers. Sergio Perez glanced the wall at turn 18 and Mark Webber did the same later on, limping back into the pits with a puncture.
However Timo Glock impressively kept his car out of the barriers despite the throttle sticking open.
Felipe Massa was sixth-fastest after a lap which he said had been full of mistakes. Paul di Resta complained of a loss of grip in his Force India and was seventh.
Nico Rosberg, Bruno Senna and Michael Schumacher completed the top ten, though the late red flag meant not everyone had done flying laps on the super-soft tyres.
Combined practice times
| Pos | Driver | Car | FP1 | FP2 | FP3 | Fri/Sat diff | Total laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull-Renault | 1’50.566 | 1’48.340 | 1’47.947 | -0.393 | 66 |
| 2 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren-Mercedes | 1’50.615 | 1’49.086 | 1’48.272 | -0.814 | 58 |
| 3 | Fernando Alonso | Ferrari | 1’51.525 | 1’48.896 | 1’48.623 | -0.273 | 57 |
| 4 | Jenson Button | McLaren-Mercedes | 1’51.459 | 1’48.651 | 1’50.524 | +1.873 | 51 |
| 5 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India-Mercedes | 1’51.658 | 1’49.339 | 1’48.859 | -0.48 | 72 |
| 6 | Kimi Raikkonen | Lotus-Renault | 1’52.716 | 1’50.345 | 1’48.865 | -1.48 | 57 |
| 7 | Mark Webber | Red Bull-Renault | 1’51.655 | 1’48.964 | 1’50.110 | +1.146 | 57 |
| 8 | Paul di Resta | Force India-Mercedes | 1’51.943 | 1’49.300 | 1’49.684 | +0.384 | 66 |
| 9 | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | 1’53.080 | 1’50.039 | 1’49.458 | -0.581 | 58 |
| 10 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1’53.227 | 1’49.790 | 1’49.699 | -0.091 | 74 |
| 11 | Bruno Senna | Williams-Renault | 1’52.629 | 1’51.452 | 1’49.715 | -1.737 | 50 |
| 12 | Michael Schumacher | Mercedes | 1’52.986 | 1’50.263 | 1’49.981 | -0.282 | 58 |
| 13 | Romain Grosjean | Lotus-Renault | 1’53.028 | 1’50.161 | 1’50.840 | +0.679 | 59 |
| 14 | Pastor Maldonado | Williams-Renault | 1’51.576 | 1’50.636 | 1’51.012 | +0.376 | 67 |
| 15 | Daniel Ricciardo | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’52.275 | 1’50.791 | 1’50.664 | -0.127 | 66 |
| 16 | Kamui Kobayashi | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’52.839 | 1’51.450 | 1’50.777 | -0.673 | 59 |
| 17 | Jean-Eric Vergne | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’53.189 | 1’52.009 | 1’51.059 | -0.95 | 73 |
| 18 | Sergio Perez | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’52.296 | 1’51.122 | 1’51.272 | +0.15 | 57 |
| 19 | Timo Glock | Marussia-Cosworth | 1’54.908 | 1’52.218 | 1’54.630 | +2.412 | 58 |
| 20 | Charles Pic | Marussia-Cosworth | 1’55.335 | 1’52.863 | 1’52.290 | -0.573 | 65 |
| 21 | Heikki Kovalainen | Caterham-Renault | 1’55.091 | 1’52.576 | 1’54.326 | +1.75 | 57 |
| 22 | Vitaly Petrov | Caterham-Renault | 1’55.760 | 1’52.936 | 1’53.781 | +0.845 | 60 |
| 23 | Narain Karthikeyan | HRT-Cosworth | 1’54.514 | 1’54.421 | -0.093 | 44 | |
| 24 | Pedro de la Rosa | HRT-Cosworth | 1’56.656 | 1’54.448 | 1’54.875 | +0.427 | 61 |
| 25 | Ma Qing Hua | HRT-Cosworth | 1’58.053 | 20 |
2012 Singapore Grand Prix
- Hamilton edges Di Resta as top Singapore driver
- Rate the Race Result: 2012 Singapore Grand Prix
- F1 fans’ videos from the Singapore Grand Prix
- Williams positive despite “extremely frustrating” race
- Top ten pictures from the 2012 Singapore Grand Prix
Image ?? Red Bull/Getty images
Max Jacobson (@vettel1)
22nd September 2012, 12:09
Looks like it’ll be a Red Bull win from pole!
photofinish
22nd September 2012, 12:11
Red bull appears like glued on the track
Max Jacobson (@vettel1)
22nd September 2012, 12:14
Nico Hulkenberg got a good lap in also (albeit some of the guys behind didn’t get their flying laps in) but Force India may be able to reclaim some of the deficit to Sauber in the constructors.
Mustalainen (@mustalainen)
22nd September 2012, 12:20
Can’t believe that Webber’s suspension didn’t sustain any damage after that
Prisoner Monkeys (@prisoner-monkeys)
22nd September 2012, 12:24
What was the episode with Vettel and the photographers?
I’ve heard various conflicting reports, but if some of them are even half true, then he’ll be summoned to the stewards for sure.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
22nd September 2012, 12:25
@prisoner-monkeys Some info here, he was warned about them before coming in:
https://twitter.com/f1fanaticlive/status/249457428981243904
https://twitter.com/f1fanaticlive/status/249457743642116096
Prisoner Monkeys (@prisoner-monkeys)
22nd September 2012, 12:37
@keithcollantine – Thanks. It’s times like this that I wish we got coverage of free practice.
If Vettel was warned that there might be photographers in the way, why did he cut the kerb anyway? It may not be as near as miss as I have been led to believe, but to my mind, common sense dictates that if you get a warning like that, you don’t cut the kerb. Furthermore, why didn’t Red Bull move to have the photographers moved on? All it would take is a quick visit to Charlie Whiting and the track marshalls could escort them out.
Something in this doesn’t sound right, but I think I’m going to need to reserve judgement until I see a replay.
Eddie (@wackyracer)
22nd September 2012, 12:25
Hamilton made few mistakes thru that lap so there’s not a promess that RedBull will win the pole
Pedro Costa (@pnunocosta)
22nd September 2012, 12:26
Vettel and Hamilton by this order will claim front row on qualifying, and then Webber, Button and Alonso will fight for the remaining top 5 places, though there could be some surprises, with the top teams trying to save super soft tyres on Q1 which are 1,5 s slower than the softs which might prove to be very dangerous (RB will definitely only use the softs in Q1, because they can count on STR to help them).
Ral (@)
22nd September 2012, 12:37
Hrm. So Lotus found about a second and a half overnight, apparently by going back to Hungary spec. Shame RBR and McLaren found about half a second as well :D
DT (@dt)
22nd September 2012, 12:40
Looks like vettel has got his car hooked to the floor all the way through. Lewis might be able to challenge him for pole. Whilst all this is going on, Alonso will be happy collecting decent points till the end of the season and claim the title. He definitely needs a bad race or two to shake him up.
Let the green light for qualifying roll!
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
22nd September 2012, 13:30
Nice spin from Petrov in the session. It seemed to escalate from nothing (though obviously it didn’t). It was just funny!