Today’s qualifying session became another bad surprise for Ferrari fans. After not the most impressive performances in free practices, in qualifying Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari made tomorrow's race more difficult.

This weekend at Paul Ricard almost all drivers have issues with Pirelli tyres. Due to hot weather and new surface, tyres grained heavily, especially with Soft. That’s why on Friday Mario Isola, the head of Pirelli Motorsport, said that drivers will try move in Q3 on Medium, to start the race on it.

Gradually, this problem began to disappear, but in qualifying some drivers continued to have it.

Sebastian Vettel was one of the victims of Soft tyres wear. In post-qualifying interview, the German said his car had a poor grip: on some laps the car was fast, but then lost the grip, causing the driver couldn’t squeeze the maximum:

"In Q3 I just didn’t have a good feeling in the car. Felt better on the harder tyres and didn’t have the grip I wanted. Some laps were okay, at the end unfortunately not so much."

Few hours later there was information that Vettel had some problems with the power of his engine during the last attempt in Q3. However, Sebastian said his gearbox issues weren’t the reason for the result.

As for Soft tyres, its ineffectiveness at Paul Ricard confirms the result of Lewis Hamilton. In P2 Valtteri Bottas set the best time – 1:30.937 on Soft, and Lewis lost him only 0,4 (1:31.361) on Medium. Moreover, in Q2 Hamilton showed phenomenal result – 1:29.520, and also on Medium. Then he changed tyres on Soft and didn’t improve result. Perhaps, he didn't have this task, but on the other hand he just couldn't do it on Soft. Although, the best time in Q3 he still showed on Soft.

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