Although there was an intense downpour pre-qualifying, there was no delay to the start and the rain held off for the majority of the sessions. Precipitation is usually the big equaliser, but there were no big surprises during qualifying today. Williams suffered in the wet conditions, but still made it into the top ten.

Lotterer's debut was a baptism of fire but he did a good job to finish ahead of his teammate. Gutiérrez had mechanical problems, whilst Maldonado had a couple of impressive spins.