Drivers explain that no one wanted to go first

In one of the craziest ends to a qualifying session, where the 12 cars in the session deliberately crawled around the circuit and missed the chance to do a final qualifying run, the drivers explain that they were all waiting for somebody else to bolt.

With 2:30 to go, Tom Chilton led the train of cars out of the pit lane, already having set the second fastest time in the session, but the RML driver slowed down so much that no one was able to start a final timed lap at the end of the session.

“As I went into the second run in Q2, I knew that my time wasn’t fast enough because I didn’t get any slipstream on my first run in Q2,” said Chilton. “So… going into the second run in Q2 I asked how much time was left, and the team said three minutes, and I asked if I can hold everyone up enough so they pass and they said you won’t be able to do it. I just went as slow as I could to see if I could, Gabriele (Tarquini) was pushing my bumper but I just held everybody up and it’s saved everybody with their tyre life, we’ve saved a set of tyres effectively and we’re still on the front row. If there wasn’t a car in front of me there was no point as I wasn’t going to go any faster, I was just going to let everyone else go faster.”

The two Castrol Honda drivers, who ended up sixth and seventh, also believed that there was no way they could improve their times unless they were able to be in another car’s slipstream.

“We know that on our own we couldn’t improve the time we could have done,” said Monteiro to TouringCarTimes. “So you either need somebody to pull you or you’re just not going to improve, so I was hoping somebody would go for it and then when I realised that it was going to be really tight I wondered if I should go, but I was 99% certain than (if I set a lap) on my own I wouldn’t improve, and if I did go everyone would follow me and they would improve. It might have looked a bit stupid from the outside, but in these kind of cars the tow is important and it was all strategy.”

Gabriele Tarquini concurred with his team-mate, adding:
“Chilton did this on purpose because he was happy with his second place, and I had no interest to be first on the second stint. I realised immediately that maybe nobody could cross the line, but for me with our speed it was impossible, I was struggling a lot to be in Q2, so there was no question that I should not go and do a lap alone or ahead, so I was waiting for somebody else to go as I knew there were some people who did not have a time.”