Analysing Lewis Hamilton's Stunning Qualifying Improvement Versus Nico Rosberg
After nine races of the 2014 Formula One season, Nico Rosberg had outqualified his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton 5-4, and each driver had scored four pole positions. At the same point this year, about halfway through the season's 19 races, Hamilton has outqualified Rosberg 8-1 (the two Merc drivers have swept the front row of the grid seven times and taken all nine poles).
But what is behind this swing in qualifying fortunes? Has Hamilton improved that much, or has Rosberg regressed? And what does it mean for the rest of the season?
To find out, let's take a look at some numbers. The table below shows the qualifying gap from Hamilton to Rosberg at each of the first nine races in 2014 and 2015 (negative numbers indicate Hamilton was ahead).
| Australia | -0.364 seconds | -0.594 seconds |
| Malaysia | -0.619 seconds | -0.074 seconds |
| Bahrain | +0.279 seconds | -0.558 seconds |
| China | -1.238 seconds | -0.042 seconds |
| Spain | -0.168 seconds | +0.267 seconds |
| Monaco | +0.059 seconds | -0.342 seconds |
| Canada | +0.079 seconds | -0.309 seconds |
| Austria | +0.148 seconds | -0.200 seconds |
| Great Britain | +3.466 seconds | -0.113 seconds |
Note that Hamilton's time for the 2014 Austrian Grand Prix is for Q2, as he did not post a time in Q3. As well, the gap between the drivers at the 2014 British Grand Prix does not represent Hamilton's actual pace, as he abandoned his final flying lap on a drying track thinking he could not improve after the first two sectors. Rosberg finished his lap and improved significantly in the final sector.
Last year, in the four races where Rosberg qualified ahead (excluding the British Grand Prix), Hamilton was an average of 0.141 seconds behind. This season, in the eight races where Hamilton has started in front, the average gap to Rosberg has been nearly double: 0.279 seconds (it was 0.609 seconds in 2014, but three of those four qualifying sessions were wet—again, perhaps not a true picture of the drivers' relative paces, but an indication of Hamilton's prowess in the rain).
Clearly, Hamilton is on another level this year. An average qualifying gap of more than a quarter-of-a-second to a team-mate driving the same car is big—but not unheard of. In 2011, for example, Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel outqualified Mark Webber 16 times in 19 races. The average gap from Vettel to Webber (excluding the Chinese Grand Prix, where Webber was eliminated in Q1) was 0.496 seconds.
So for anyone complaining that F1 isn't competitive enough right now, remember, it could be worse!
Hamilton and Rosberg have both improved their qualifying times at every race this season compared to 2014—unsurprisingly, given the ongoing improvement of the cars and engines under the new regulations introduced last year.
But Hamilton's five largest improvements relative to Rosberg's came at the five races where his team-mate outqualified him last year. Perhaps that is intuitive (i.e. Hamilton probably had more time to gain at those races where he didn't perform as well on Saturday last year), but it also shows that he is making a concerted effort to improve the one weakness in his armour last year: his qualifying form.
Rosberg, meanwhile, had enough trouble winning even when he did qualify on pole last season, posting an historically terrible pole-to-win conversion rate. Starting behind Hamilton at nearly every race this year has made his job that much more difficult. Rosberg has only finished ahead of Hamilton twice in the eight grands prix where he has started behind him (and one of those—Monaco—doesn't really count).
That difference is manifesting itself in the drivers' standings, where Hamilton now has a 17-point lead over Rosberg. At this time last year, the German was ahead by four points.
Starting in Monaco 2014, Rosberg took 10 of 14 poles to the end of the season. He won just three of those races (plus Austria, where he started third, but ahead of Hamilton).
That said, Rosberg has improved his race craft this year, beating Hamilton legitimately in Spain and Austria. But if he cannot reverse the qualifying trend, he is going to find it nearly impossible to beat Hamilton to the championship.
Although Rosberg usually remains upbeat—at least in public—following his qualifying near-misses, it must be weighing on him psychologically to know that Hamilton has stolen his one edge from last year.
The current record for poles in a single season is 15, set by Vettel in that dominant 2011 campaign. Hamilton is currently on pace to break that standard, as well as Nigel Mansell's record of qualifying on pole for 88 percent of the races in 1992 (Hamilton would need 17 poles to break that mark).
Records or not, though, Hamilton would probably settle for his third drivers' championship—and his qualifying performances thus far have him well on his way.
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