China: pre-qualifying 2019


Incidentally, if you’ve been following my tips do feel free to buy my book Crown of Blood (or books, if you haven’t bought any of the trilogy yet). It’s a rather good fantasy and only a few pounds. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crown-Blood-Bloody-Trilogy-Book-ebook/dp/B07PLFC2PB/

Pre-practice I decided to back (and mentioned on PB) Bottas for fastest qualifier, each way (third the odds top 2) at 8.5 (9 with boost). He’s been very close behind Hamilton in both qualifying sessions so far, and if Mercedes is the fastest in China, which I think they were last year, then he stands a good chance of a front row start. I’ve been mildly surprised by just how quickly Ferrari, and Leclerc especially, have seen their stock rise due to Bahrain. It was an impressive performance but it was also one race of many this year.

Between the last race and this, Raikkonen opined that it’s easier to follow cars under the new regulations, contrary to what many had feared. This is also backed up by Hulkenberg’s impressive performance (until his car ran out of electricity) which saw him climb from 17th to, I think, 6th. Increased churn from grid to flag may be the result, but this also makes Gasly’s lacklustre début seem worse (and it isn’t helped by comparison with Leclerc).

In other news, all four Renault cars, having a 75% DNF rate last time out, now have new spec MGU-Ks.

In first practice, Vettel was quickest, a couple of tenths ahead of Hamilton, with Leclerc lagging just half a tenth further back. Verstappen was a few tenths behind, with a similar gap to Bottas, and then over half a second to Ricciardo, Gasly, Kvyat, Stroll, and Grosjean. I know it’s only practice, but Gasly was over a second behind Verstappen. He needs to get his skates on.

Bottas topped second practice, a mighty two-hundredths ahead of Vettel. Verstappen was two-tenths further back, but as Hamilton was seven-tenths behind his team mate that rather suggests he either had problems or was on another programme. Hulkenberg and Sainz continued their good form, separated by a mere half-tenth and the Spaniard was one-hundredths ahead of Leclerc. Norris, Ricciardo, and Gasly rounded out the top 10.

At this stage I was tempted to set up a hedge on the Bottas bet, at around 2.5 or 3, on the Ladbrokes Exchange only for the market to seemingly disappear. Ah, well.

Bottas is now 7 (7.5 with boost) to be the fastest qualifier. Given he’s been very close behind Hamilton so far and qualifying in the first two races was two-by-two, I think this is value (although obviously not as much as the 9 I got for the pre-practice tip). I believe that’s still worth backing if you didn’t go for the earlier tip.

I also decided to back, with a small stake, Bottas each way (fifth the odds top 3) to win the race, at 8.5 (9 with boost), as tipped by Mr. Sandpit.

Qualifying starts at 7am, and the race is just shortly thereafter on Sunday.

Morris Dancer

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