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2015 Malaysian F1 GP springs hot, humid surprises [spoilers]

In the two weeks since Australia both Mercedes and Ferrari spoke of the improved performance from their respective cars. In Malaysia, Ferrari showed it. Lewis Hamilton still put his Mercedes-AMG Petronas on pole position, but Sebastian Vettel got within two whiskers of the Brit, lining up second just 0.074 behind. Afterward, Vettel said Ferrari could win the race if everything went well. But in qualifying we didn't know how much of Ferrari's performance was truly down to the car and how much was down to the wet weather that struck near the beginning of Q2. The rain didn't hamper Nico Rosberg's run – the German said "I just didn't drive good enough" – and he took third spot in the second Mercedes-AMG Petronas. Showing what the Infiniti Red Bull Racing chassis can do when the power unit is working properly, teammates Daniel Ricciardo and Daniil Kvyat grabbed fourth and fifth. Whippersnapper Max Verstappen, in his second race, qualified in sixth with an excellent drive through the rain; just 0.030 behind Kvyat, he said he could have got fifth if he hadn't had a running problem with his brakes. Williams head of vehicle performance Rob Smedley said he wouldn't complain about Mercedes' advantage, but Felipe Massa has spent the whole season so far banging the alarm about Ferrari's pace. He says Williams has lost its straight-line advantage, part of the reason the first Grove car is back in seventh, while Valtteri Bottas is in eighth. Between them was Romain Grosjean in the Lotus, but he got dropped two positions for a pit-lane infraction in Q2, so he'll be tenth. Ahead of him is Marcus Ericsson in the Sauber, who would lead the charge to turn in another surprise for the Swiss team. But the real surprise came from the Scuderia Ferrari, who, on a bright, sunny day proved that they don't need to add water for race-winning pace. While Hamilton got made usual awesome start at the lights, Vettel channeled that other famous German Ferrari driver and immediately cut across the track to intimidate Rosberg, maintaining his second place position into the first turn. Arguably the race-winning move came three laps later at that same turn, when Ericsson plunged in too fast and swapped ends, beaching the rear of his Sauber in the gravel trap. The safety car came out when the recovery truck emerged to retrieve the Sauber, and nearly all of the front-runners took to the pits to swap out of the medium tires. Vettel, however, didn't.

Race Recap: 2014 Malaysian F1 Grand Prix [spoilers]

The Malaysian Grand Prix is always one of the jokers on the Formula One calendar: you know it's going to rain during the weekend, but you don't know when. This year it began during qualifying, the dammed up clouds over the Sepang track dumping their reservoirs just before Q1 and causing a 50-minute delay.
The conditions helped Infiniti Red Bull Racing close the gap on Mercedes AMG Petronas and split the Silver Arrows cars, Sebastian Vettel lining up in second on the grid behind pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton, ahead of Nico Rosberg. Fernando Alonso recovered from a suspension-damaging incident with Toro Rosso driver Daniil Kyvat to take fourth, followed by the second Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo in fifth, then the off-form Kimi Räikkönen in sixth in the second Ferrari, Nico Hülkenberg in the Force India, star rookie Kevin Magnussen in the first McLaren ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne in the Toro Rosso, and Jenson Button in the second McLaren finishing up the top ten.
After that, though, the clouds decided they were done with F1. Save a few drop at the final corners during the race, the track stayed completely dry. And except for the beginning and the end, for the most part, so was the race.

Overnight action from the 24 Hours of Le Mans

We won't go into a recap here, but there are still leading positions being fought for in all classes - it's so close that leads are changing when a car goes into the pits. We'll let the recap wait until the end of the race, so for now enjoy some shots from last night's action at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.