McLaren continue to look strong after Lewis Hamilton topped the time sheets in first practice and posted a solid showing in the second session, just 2 tenths shy of Michael Schumacher. Rosberg posted some quick times too, further endorsing the view that Mercedes could be a threat in 2012, in qualifying at least.
As with all practice and test sessions, it’s tricky to derive any solid facts from the timings, but for the sake of it, look at the times below and you’ll see that Sauber are again up towards the sharp end, whereas Ferrari barely troubled the top 10. Lotus also don’t appear to be having much luck with the Shanghai track, leaving the top spots to McLaren, Mercedes and Red Bull.
In other news, the protest against Mercedes’ fancy ‘Super DRS’ from Lotus has been dismissed by the FIA, so Ross Brawn’s team are free to continue as they are – maybe we’ll see a silver arrow on the front row come Sunday.
Bad news for Hamilton fans – no matter how quick he goes in qualifying on Saturday, he’ll start 5 places down due to a gearbox change.
You can browse the full times, splits and rankings for both Friday practice sessions below, simply click the table headings to sort them by FP1 times, FP2 times or number of laps. Fun. As well as getting yourself up to speed with the current form for China – make sure you familiarise yourself with the TV times for the Chinese GP too.
|
Driver
|
FP1
|
Best
|
Diff
|
Laps
|
FP2
|
Best
|
Diff
|
Laps
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hamilton | 1 | 1’37.106 | 7 | 2 | 1’36.145 | 0.1720 | 29 | |
| Rosberg | 2 | 1’38.116 | 1.010 | 14 | 5 | 1’36.617 | 0.6440 | 31 |
| Schumacher | 3 | 1’38.316 | 1.210 | 14 | 1 | 1’35.973 | 32 | |
| Pu008eerez | 4 | 1’38.584 | 1.478 | 13 | 11 | 1’37.417 | 1.4440 | 22 |
| Kobayashi | 5 | 1’38.911 | 1.805 | 12 | 7 | 1’36.956 | 0.9830 | 28 |
| Webber | 6 | 1’38.977 | 1.871 | 15 | 4 | 1’36.433 | 0.4600 | 24 |
| Vettel | 7 | 1’39.198 | 2.092 | 12 | 3 | 1’36.160 | 0.1870 | 27 |
| Button | 8 | 1’39.199 | 2.093 | 6 | 6 | 1’36.711 | 0.7380 | 28 |
| Ricciardo | 9 | 1’39.748 | 2.642 | 16 | 12 | 1’37.616 | 1.6430 | 33 |
| Vergne | 10 | 1’39.768 | 2.662 | 14 | 14 | 1’37.930 | 1.9570 | 32 |
| Alonso | 11 | 1’40.056 | 2.950 | 14 | 10 | 1’37.316 | 1.3430 | 32 |
| Massa | 12 | 1’40.153 | 3.047 | 14 | 17 | 1’38.293 | 2.3200 | 31 |
| Senna | 13 | 1’40.298 | 3.192 | 8 | 18 | 1’38.783 | 2.8100 | 37 |
| Hu009fulkenberg | 14 | 1’40.328 | 3.222 | 13 | 9 | 1’37.191 | 1.2180 | 31 |
| Maldonado | 15 | 1’40.540 | 3.434 | 12 | 16 | 1’38.176 | 2.2030 | 35 |
| Kovalainen | 16 | 1’41.071 | 3.965 | 14 | 19 | 1’38.990 | 3.0170 | 36 |
| Grosjean | 17 | 1’41.204 | 4.098 | 14 | 15 | 1’37.972 | 1.9990 | 26 |
| Glock | 18 | 1’42.330 | 5.224 | 14 | 21 | 1’39.651 | 3.6780 | 15 |
| Petrov | 19 | 1’42.521 | 5.415 | 11 | 20 | 1’39.346 | 3.3730 | 20 |
| Di Resta | 20 | 1’44.118 | 7.012 | 8 | 8 | 1’36.966 | 0.9930 | 31 |
| de la Rosa | 21 | 1’44.227 | 7.121 | 10 | 22 | 1’40.343 | 4.3700 | 25 |
| Pic | 22 | 1’44.500 | 7.394 | 15 | 23 | 1’40.753 | 4.7800 | 30 |
| Karthikeyan | 23 | 1’47.204 | 10.098 | 12 | 24 | 1’41.125 | 5.1520 | 26 |
| Rau008aikkou009anen | 24 | 1’50.465 | 13.359 | 11 | 13 | 1’37.836 | 1.8630 | 30 |
Schumacher looking quick, quicker than Red Bull at least – credit: OctanePhotos.co.uk
gary fair
July 24, 2012
i STILL.. cant understand in a country that loves formula one (italy) WHY! the 2012 indycar made by dallara is so UGLY!…. (the side is fat, and whats that back of the real wheels?!?). what on earth were they (dallara) thinking?!?….. all dallara had to do was copy a f1 car!…