Round 02 - Malaysia: Qualifying

Overall Result: P8, 1:36.324

Initially the result felt a little disappointing, coming off the back of a podium finish at Melbourne to then qualify 8th and two places behind Heidfeld. However, in retrospect, the result is reassuring more than anything else. Firstly, with the incident in FP1 taking at least 1.5 to 2 hours out of potential running time this weekend, there was always the chance with this amount of lost time that Vitaly wouldn't be able to find a good setup at all. So for that reason alone, P8 is perfectly credible.
The other reassurance, with regards to being behind Nick on the grid, is that Q1 and Q2 times suggest that Petrov has the edge over his more experienced teammate with Vitaly being quicker in both and a mistake in the last  two corners serving as a credible reason for him losing ground to the German. (See the video at the end of post.)
Here is how Qualifying went for Vitaly:

Q1

Number of Flying Laps: 1
Tyre Choice: Option
Time: 1:37.210
Placement: 7th

Q2

Number of Flying Laps: 1
Tyre Choice: Option
Time: 1:36.642
Placement: 8th

Q3

Number of Flying Laps: 1
Tyre Choice: Option
Time: 1:36.324
Placement 8th

Speed Trap

Placement: 6th
Speed: 306.4km/h

Best Sector Times

S1: 24.777 (6th)
S2: 32.424 (9th)
S3: 39.123 (7th)

Everything seems very consistent, which in a way is reassuring, consistency is the first step in improving on the driver from last year. Everything also points to the position of the car, relative to the other teams, clearly Red Bull and Mclaren are out of reach in terms of raw speed at the moment but compared to Ferrari, there seems to be very little between themselves and Renault.

Here's some onboard footage of qualifying, I believe this is from Q3, at the end of his one and only flying lap where you can clearly see him locking the right front into turn 13 (I think? not sure on the number exactly) and consequently flat-spotting the tyre. Then into the last corner he runs perhaps a little wider than would be ideal (whether this is due to the flat spot, I don't have the experience to say), although it must be said that quite a few drivers were taking the corner wider than usual during the session as a whole.