“Yeah, I mean, you can always do a better job. But also I think also Nico could have done a better lap” – Max Verstappen

The Ferraris also look fast as well as Spa-specialist Kimi Raikkonen finished only .017 seconds behind Verstappen and his teammate Sebastian Vettel just behind him in 4th. Rounding out the top 5 is other Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo.

Rosberg was the lone Mercedes in Q3 as Lewis Hamilton choose not to set a fast time due to his massive grid penalty for changing this engine before the race. Lewis will be joined at the back of the path by Fernando Alonso, how also sustained a grid penalty for an engine change.

It was more bad news for Alonso however, as he once again suffered a mechanical failure in Q1. Since he’s suffered a huge penalty anyway it will not be a big deal if he changes out more components, but surely he’s yet to see the planned upgraded power that Jenson Button has been enjoying in his McLaren.

“On the dyno it is better and on Jenson’s side it is delivering the power. On my side too but I had 4 laps today. ” – Fernando Alonso

Full Qualifying Results here

Max Verstappen and Daniel Riccardo led Free Practice 2 in Belgium today with the benefit of Super Soft tires while Mercedes concentrated on longer runs with harder tires. Regardless of leading the closest Force India by over half of a second, Daniel Ricciardo believes they still have some unleashed speed in the car.

 “I think we can still be quicker than what we showed today, but I feel like we definitely got into the right rhythm.” – Daniel Ricciardo

Hulkenberg and Perez show strong pace with 3rd and 5th best times 

Force India has a history of being surprisingly quick at Spa and they continued that tradition today. Force India driver Nico Hulkenberg led Sebastian Vettel by .366 seconds with Sergio Perez only trailing Vettel by only .077 seconds. Could we see another Force India spoiler in Qualifying?

“I wasn’t too happy with the balance in the morning, but we were able to improve it for the afternoon: it’s still not perfect, so there’s a bit of work to do overnight, trying to use the information we got today, but it’s a decent starting point.” – Nico Hulkenberg

Hamilton takes an entirely new engine, drops 30 grid spots

As expected, Mercedes bit the bullet and replaced the entire engine on Lewis Hamilton’s car. With these upgrades he’ll be penalized a whopping 30 grid positions (there are only 22 cars on the grid). If these grid penalties aren’t getting ridiculous for all of us yet, I don’t know when they will.

Lewis focused primarily on long race practice today given that he will certainly be starting from the back of the grid.

Rosberg tests Halo in FP1 – Ugly is fast

Nico Rosberg not only set the fastest times in FP1, he also tested the Halo protection system in this Mercedes. Nico loved it as he was able to set the fastest time of the Free Practice 1 session with it fitted.

“The team have done a great job on the halo. It doesn’t disturb me when driving. I could go fast straight away and even set the best time of the session with it this morning” – Nico Rosberg

Alonso sites out FP1 and will incur another mind-boggling grid penalty

And….. The McLaren Honda of Fernando Alonso is once again hit with an egregious grid penalty of 15 places. For a team that is doing everything it can to break the monotony of Mercedes domination, Formula One is certainly not helping with these penalties. Fernando is looking at the bright side however, as his former teammate Lewis Hamilton will likely be next to him in a faster car at the back of the grid.

“We’ll be starting Sunday’s race from the back of the grid, but we’ll be trying our best to recover positions from there. I expect Lewis [Hamilton], who’ll be starting next to me, will be quicker than me, so I’ll try to hang on to his tail, put a rope around his car and get him to pull me through the field! ” – Fernando Alonso