In the lead up to the Malaysian Grand Prix all the stories centred on Red Bull and Mercedes' anger towards the 2013 Pirelli tyres however, in an ironic twist the two teams found themselves at the front of the race managing their drivers more so than the tyres.

In the lead up to the race the Red Bull and Mercedes camps argued that Lotus had not only gleaned an advantage by virtue of its old car (Renault R30) being used as Pirelli's development car, but the new construction/compounds of the Pirelli tyres hindered those teams with more downforce.

Pirelli had sought a solution to its ageing test car for some time (having previously used a Toyota TF109) with seemingly little assistance from the teams themselves until Lotus offered up a chassis from their archives. Although still dated in comparison to the cars we see fielded today, a year newer than the TF109 the R30 provided a better construct with which to work.

The problem with the Toyota variant is that it would firstly have required a significant level of investment by Pirelli in order to upgrade the car aerodynamically, whilst I'm quite sure the availability of Toyota engines/components was becoming more scarce. Meanwhile, efforts made by F1's current constructors (Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault & Cosworth) to improve their offerings for their customers via different mapping etc would also be unavailable to Pirelli via Toyota.

Therefore, in order to stay relevant, Pirelli needed another car with a current engine that would help to model its 2013 tyres. In terms of Lotus benefiting from the use of one of its older cars I did have my own reservations at the time. We must however concede that Lotus was the team on top of the tyres in terms of degradation throughout 2012 and so its new chassis (E21) can merely be seen as a continuation of that trend. It may well have had the data from R30 and be able to cross reference it with the tyre tests that took place in Brazil but to say this is the reason the team is good on the Pirelli's is, in my opinion, reaching a little.

Moving back to the critical comments made by Red Bull & Mercedes regarding downforce levels we can once again look at the test equipment made available to Pirelli. Pirelli, after all, can only make good from the data from the test car and enhance the figures to suit the performance difference a newer car may have. Red Bull clearly has the car with the most downforce but feels that the tyres don't enhance this. With tyres that clearly degrade more rapidly through thermal degradation it does suggest that whilst others may be dissipating this heat over a wider portion of the tyre's contact patch, Red Bull is once again playing with the margins.

It may also be fair to say that some teams have managed the aerodynamic changes for the new tyres better than their rivals with a new construction to the tyre altering the way in which the air moves around the car.

With yet another qualifying session being affected by wet weather conditions, albeit not as bad as Melbourne, we still find ourselves questioning the true structure of the grid. Sebastian Vettel once again taking pole position but with the fast starting Ferraris poised to challenge into the first corner from second and third positions.