Oh dear.  This bodes ill for tomorrow's 2017 Grand Prix of Japan.  Here's the provisional grid:

Pos	Driver	Car	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:29.047	1:27.819	1:27.319
2	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	1:29.332	1:28.543	1:27.651
3	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:29.352	1:28.225	1:27.791
4	Smiley Ricciardo	Red Bull Racing	1:29.475	1:28.935	1:28.306
5	Embryo Verstappen	Red Bull Racing	1:29.181	1:28.747	1:28.332
6	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	1:29.163	1:29.079	1:28.498
7	False Esteban!	Force India Mercedes	1:30.115	1:29.199	1:29.111
8	Sergio Perez	Force India Mercedes	1:29.696	1:29.343	1:29.260
9	FelipeNot Nasr	Williams Mercedes	1:30.352	1:29.687	1:29.480
10	Fernando Alonso	McLaren Honda	1:30.525	1:29.749	1:30.687
11	Stoffelwaffle	McLaren Honda	1:30.654	1:29.778
12	Nico Hulkenberg	Renault	1:30.252	1:29.879
13	Kevin Magnussen	Haas Ferrari	1:30.774	1:29.972
14	Unemployed  Palmer	Renault	1:30.516	1:30.022
15	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso	1:30.565	1:30.413
16	Lettuce Grosjean	Haas Ferrari	1:30.849
17	Pierre Ghastly	Toro Rosso	1:31.317
18	Pleasant Stroll	Williams Mercedes	1:31.409
19	Sony Ericsson	Sauber Ferrari	1:31.597
20	Herelein Wehrlein	Sauber Ferrari	1:31.885

It's hardly unusual for Lewis Hamilton to be on pole.  For him to be on pole in so dominant a manner is another thing altogether.  This season, there's usually been some sort of realistic threat from some other driver to take pole, even if Hamilton still ended up with it.  Not today.  At no point during the quals session today did he look even mildly disconcerted.  Just a massive curbstomp of a quals.

The one saving grace for Seb Vettel is that he'll actually be starting second, not third, as Bottas has a five-grid-spot penalty to deal with.  On the whole, Ferrari has looked good over race distances this year, better than they do during Quals.  That may not matter, though, because of just how massive the Merc looked today.  

Sorry this is short and late, been working today.  Race overnight, see ya afterwards sometime!

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