I have been looking at what I think the pole time will be in Sepang, this is even harder to estimate then a lot of the tracks as there was no dry Quali last year. If you take the P3 fastest times from last year on all the races where they had dry Quali the Pole time was 1.19% faster than the Fastest P3 time. If you apply this to Malaysia 2014 you get a 1:37.827 for last years pole. As for the year on year improvement we don't have much data to go on (especially due to wet Aus quali in 2014) but I think if you compare both the P3 times 14-15 and the fastest lap you get a decrease of about 1.66% in laptime. Apply this to the Psuedo pole time from 14 and you get a 1:36.203.
As For the 107% time that based on the above is a 1:42.937 At the last race which Marussia Qualified in 2014 (RUS) Chilton was 4.951% of LH's Q1 time. If you add the 1.66% Merc have added that puts Manor 6.6% ish off the pace assuming they can the car to run as well as they did in Russia (which would be v difficult) plus the drivers don't know the car or the circuit and we don't know if the 2015 mods to the 2014 cars have had a significant effect on performance. I would put that if they get to run properly they have about a 20% chance of getting a car below 107%
Thoughts
Edited by Ar558, 20 March 2015 - 23:11.