More rain at the Circuit of The Americas has ruined Saturday’s activities. Some lap times were set in the morning sessions, but the afternoon fell apart. As a result of more bad weather, qualifying has been moved to Sunday morning.
As a result of heavy rain, similar to the conditions that canceled free practice two on Friday, qualifying has been postponed to Sunday morning at 9:00am local time. After many delays during the session for poor weather conditions, it was decided by the FIA at 4:00pm local time that there would be no break in the weather and that it would be unsafe to run in these conditions.
In the morning, all of the teams were able to head out onto the wet track and complete some timed laps. However, due to the conditions, drivers were only able to complete less than 15 laps in the entire one hour session. Despite being able to run the session, the weather was still dreadful and the track was drenched.
As rain is forecast for the morning on Sunday, it is possible that the qualifying will not be run. Because the race will still be held on Sunday, the FIA has very little opportunity to push back qualifying before having to cancel it. Should the qualifying be canceled, the starting grid will be determined by the results of free practice three. This would put Lewis Hamilton into pole position, as he topped the timed session.
Weather reports show that, although the morning will be wet, the rain is expected to make an exit for the race. This means that the drivers shouldn’t have to deal with the rain, but will still have to deal with the wet track conditions and loss of grip, due to the lack of rubber on the racing surface and the amount of water on the track.
