Malaysian Forecast

The Malaysian Grand Prix at the Sepang circuit near Kuala Lumpur usually produces a pretty decent race. Just look to last years multi-21 team orders fiasco from last year as an example. This year should be no exception as the teams arrive with so much still to learn about the 2014 machines they’ve created.

We still might not learn too much about the competitive order after this weekend. Malaysia is traditionally hot and humid, so it will place great stress on the cars cooling, something many of the Renault engine teams have had great trouble with in testing, particularly Red Bull.

The weather for the weekend is predicting storms throughout so it seems likely that we could be in for a topsy turvy qualifying and race, which is no doubt an exciting prospect but also disguises just which team is where when it comes to a normal dry race weekend.

The tyres Pirelli have brought are the medium and hard compounds. How much usage they’re going to get is hard to tell, it all depends on how much rain we’re going to get and at the  moment it looks like a lot of running will be done on the wet and intermediate tyres.

As is usual at most circuits these days there will be two DRS zones one on the back straight approaching the final corner and one on the start finish straight. These are unlikely to play a major role in the race should it be affected by precipitation as DRS is banned in wet conditions.

So what can we expect from the competitive order this weekend? Well a lot of teams are making bold claims about what they can achieve with many claiming Australia wasn’t a true reflection. As I’ve already said Malaysia may not provide a whole lot more information if you want the truth but McLaren for example through Ron Dennis have claimed they’ve found half a second for this race.

Can that be extrapolated for the wet conditions? It’s hard to say right now, but after a successful double podium opening weekend it’ll be interesting to see their progress. Jenson Button is great in wet conditions while new star Kevin Magnussen will be very keen to demonstrate his prowess in the wet stuff again after impressing with his rain affected qualifying performance in Melbourne.

Ferrari are well aware they need to work on the speed of their car. Fernando Alonso only just managed to get ahead of Nico Hulkenberg’s Force India last time out while Kimi Raikkonen suffered a myriad of issues mostly blaming set up problems. At least they have a reliable base to start from, although they were suffering from power issues in the race, so if all is well I expect to look far more racey this weekend.

I hope Williams can demonstrate their full performance. If Felipe Massa hadn’t have been taken out by Kamui Kobayashi’s brakeless Caterham at the first corner or Valtteri Bottas hadn’t have clunked the wall (although still recovered to sixth) then I feel sure they would have nabbed a podium fairly easily.

It’s important they do, as there should be no doubt the likes of Ferrari and McLaren will improve a great deal especially when we get back to Europe, now is the time for Williams to get the big points while the going is good.

Other teams with a lot to prove include Lotus. They’ll be happy just to get their car to the finish. They haven’t completed a race distance yet, but everyone was impressed that they managed to get two cars past half distance, which was a treat as they had barely strung five laps together. They’ve got an interesting car but I don’t expect them to show any great improvement until round five in Spain.

Marussia and Caterham look like they'll be battling at the back again after a few races of elevated position while I'm afraid Sauber look a bit slow at the moment.

One of the teams to look out I think is Force India. Nico Hulkenberg had an impressive drive (yet again) and will be looking for another top result. If it rains, look out for him and Sergio Perez (so impressive just two years ago in Malaysia). They are armed with the Mercedes power unit, so should always be one to watch over the next few race weekends.

Now we come to Red Bull. They were remarkable by getting to the end with Daniel Ricciardo’s car despite not having done a race distance before the opener. Ok, so they were disqualified for the fuel flow rate being consistently greater than the 100kg/h it should have been but they are appealing and feel confident they’ll get their points back but that’s another story.

What we can tell though is that once they iron out the reliability problems they’re once again going to be involved in the championship fight. They’ve barely tapped into the potential of this car, and after such a strong showing they’ll have been delighted. So Sebastian Vettel didn’t make it over five laps, that’s a niggle that was to be expected in many ways.

I expect a more coherent challenge from both cars, especially from Vettel as he seeks to put Ricciardo in his place after the Australian out-qualified him in Australia albeit with a down on power car. Red Bull and particularly Vettel are the ones to watch this weekend in regards to their pace and whether they can keep their Renault power unit cool enough in the extreme heat and humidity we expect.

Of course out in front we can still expect to see the silver of Mercedes leading the way. At the moment if they get far enough away in the early stages  it could  be a two horse race for the title between Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton.

As brilliant as Mercedes were in Australia they had their own problems with Hamilton retiring after only two laps. However, Rosberg went on to dominate the race. Lewis will want to assert his authority on this particular team mate battle sooner rather than later. He knows he has the edge in out and out speed, but in the races it could be a different matter, Malaysia is the time for Lewis to get a victory on the board and it’ll be game on. Even at this early stage he can’t afford to fall behind Rosberg any more especially if other teams begin to catch them…

Let's see how the engine noise continues to grow on us too. I think we'll be used to it in a few races and on TV it comes across fine. Live though it seems the feedback is it could be louder. I'm sure they'll sort something out, Formula 1 is about the spectacle and the awesomeness of the cars live. It's what everyone says if they attend a race. Ok the cars will still look great to watch, but it's the sound vibrating through your body that is the most amazing thing. That needs to be there.

So in short Mercedes will lead, McLaren and Williams will challenge them, Ferrari will disappoint and make Fernando annoyed, Hulkenberg will offer us a surprise while Red Bull I’m sure are about to make Mercedes wonder whether they really do have the best car. It’s going to be an exciting weekend of racing.

all photo's taken from autosport.com