Mercedes surprised with pole position in Spielberg

Robert Wickens took a rather unexpected pole position in Spielberg, as BMW looked all set to take the top spot in qualifying. The Canadian managed to pull out a great last gasp lap to top BMW Team MTEK’s Timo Glock by a mere 0.006s, therefore claiming his – and Mercedes’ – second pole position of the year. Good performances for Pascal Wehrlein and Christian Vietoris put two more C-Coupés in the top eight, claiming fifth and seventh respectively.

Wolfgang Schattling, Head of Motorsport Marketing & Communications at Mercedes, admitted the result was unexpected even within the team and praised Wickens’ performance.

“The pole position for Robert came as a bit of a surprise to us,” he said. “Ahead of the race weekend here at Spielberg, we had been hoping to get one or maybe two cars into the top eight, but Robert’s performance was simply sensational. We have always known that Robert is an exceptionally talented driver, and today he has proved that yet again. The grid positions for Pascal [Wehrlein] and Christian [Vietoris] also bode well for tomorrow’s race. All in all, we can feel well satisfied with the way qualifying went. We now have to follow up this performance with a good result in the race itself,” concluded Schattling.

Wickens is on cloud nine after claiming pole position.

“That’s super, simply fabulous,” said the Canadian. “I had no idea how tight it was as I was putting in my final lap. A big thank you goes to my team. That was by no means an easy qualifying session, but they did a fantastic job. Three Mercedes-Benz drivers in the top eight represents a strong team performance.”

The pole-sitter also talked about his mistake early on in the session, which did not jeopardise his chances to put in a lap good enough for pole.

“The earlier spin was my fault,” he said. “Unfortunately, I took too much of a risk on Turn 8, and the same thing happened as in free practice. Luckily, I managed to keep calm and rounded off the session with a super lap. We’re in the best possible position for the start of the race. It would be nice if we could cross the finish line in P1.”

Pascal Wehrlein, who will start from fifth, believes setting his time early in the session slightly penalised him.

“That was a good qualifying. I’m happy with the result. I was still expecting a tough weekend after this morning’s first practice session, but we’ve really improved the car. There was everything to play for in Q3.

“I was even in P1 for quite a long time. I went out on track right at the start of the third session. I slipped down the field a little at the end, though, as I only had one set of tyres. Still, all is not lost starting from grid position five.”

Christian Vietoris, the third and last Mercedes in the top ten, is happy with the result and sees it as a good starting point for tomorrow’s race.

“That was one of the best qualifying sessions this season. P7 is a good grid position for the start of the race. It’s nice to have a car in which I can compete at the front of the field again. It makes driving fun.”

The German is the highest-placed Mercedes driver in the championship on 31 points, 25 of which coming from a tactical win at a wet Oschersleben earlier this year from the back of the pack.