The Spanish Grand Prix At Circuit de Catalunya is Sunday, May 12, at 7:30 a.m. EDT. Be sure to catch all the action on NBC Sports. For race fans out there that will not have access to NBC Sports when the lights go out, be sure to catch the live stream online by signing up for NBC Sports LiveExtra here.
Circuit de Catalunya might as well be home race for Mercedes as its drivers Niko Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton dominated qualifying and locked out the front row.
Like sleeping giants, the two Mercedes did not emerge onto the track until the closing 5 minutes to push a single stint flying lap. Lewis Hamilton made the first mark with a solid 1:21.728 and set an early pace ahead of his teammate, the Red Bulls and the Ferraris. Jenson Button's McLaren finished close to two seconds off the pace, a worrying time that Button claimed was affected by a slow and wide Williams.
By Q3, Kimi Raikkonen raised the bar by lowering lap times at Catalunya to 1:21.676, edging Nico by a tenth. Fernando Alonso's Ferrari responded as well, edging Kimi by a mere three hundreth of a second. A tense showdown, it was a gamble between clinching pole and conserving tires. Sebastian Vettel and the fast Red Bull paced faster still with 1:21.602.
Eventually, Mercedes Benz stopped playing games. Nico Rosberg's Mercedes set a blistering 1 minute 20.718 seconds, a substantial 0.254 seconds quicker than Hamilton,
The Spanish Grand Prix At Circuit de Catalunya is Sunday, May 12, at 7:30 a.m. EDT. Be sure to catch all the action on NBC Sports. For race fans out there that will not have access to NBC Sports when the lights go out, be sure to catch the live stream online by signing up for NBC Sports LiveExtra here.
The Top 10 Sunday Spanish Grand Prix 2013 grid is as follows:
1. Nico Rosberg, 9, Mercedes
2. Lewis Hamilton, 10, Mercedes
3. Sebastian Vettel, 1, Red Bull Racing-Renault
4. Kimi Raikkonen, 7, Lotus-Renault
5. Fernando Alonso, 3, Ferrari
6. Felipe Massa, 4, Ferrari
7. Romain Grosjean, 8, Lotus-Renault
8. Mark Webber, 2, Red Bull Racing-Lotus
9. Sergio Perez, 6, McLaren Merdcedes
10. Paul di Resta, 4, Force India-Mercedes
