Ferrari's difficult September continued into October following a Saturday of mixed results in qualifying for this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix.
The session saw Lewis Hamilton take a dominant pole for Mercedes while Sebastian Vettel was the highest placed Ferrari by qualifying in third. This will become second place on the grid for Sunday's race, with Valtteri Bottas carrying a gearbox penalty after being the second part of a Silver Arrows 1-2.
"I mean qualifying has been quite good to be honest," said Vettel, despite being adrift by almost half a second to polesitter Hamilton.
"I tried everything on the last run, knew I had to take a bit more risk and didn’t work, I ran out of track at the exit of the Esses, but I knew that even if Valtteri got past it would still be a front row.
"I would have loved to have been quicker, but quite amazing with the new car around here, special day," he added.
On the second side of the Ferrari garage, the story was not quite the same, with Kimi Raikkonen only managing to qualify in sixth. Like Bottas, Raikkonen also has a five-place grid penalty which will drop him to 11th on the starting grid for Sunday's race.
"For sure the team did a great job, obviously pay price for mistakes, made mistakes today, had to change the gearbox, was far from ideal to prepare for qualifying especially after yesterday’s little running, this is what we got.
"[The car] felt okay but obviously when I had to push I made a mistake on first run in last qualifying. Pretty average lap time in the second, a bit tricky after the mistake that I did."
Raikkonen pinned his lack of pace down to crashing in FP3 prior to qualifying which shortened his running in the session: "We're obviously not where we should be, consequences of missing and crashing in the wrong moment of the weekend," said the Finn.
When asked about his chances for Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix, Raikkonen said: "We’ll see, obviously not ideal starting position but we have a good car."
Raikkonen's starting position is far from ideal for Ferrari, with the team needing to score a large haul of points this weekend if it is to relaunch its challenge to Merceredes in the Constructors' Championship. It is also imperative for Vettel to beat Hamilton in Japan if he is to keep his hopes of a fifth world championship alive, being 34 points down with five races remaining this season.
