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After a somewhat frustrating start to the day, returning from lunch to find a dry track was a welcome surprise as the drivers settled back in to the cockpits of their E20s. Both Kimi and Romain departed the garage at almost exactly 14:00 with a busy programme now on the agenda after limited running during the morning session.
Romain opted for a short first run on the medium compound tyre, completing 4 laps before returning to base. Kimi chose a different strategy, with two stints of 4 and 3 laps sandwiching a pit stop simulation with front wing change.
With the lap times tumbling, it soon became clear that the team were placing an emphasis on race pace rather than single lap speed as Kimi and Romain parked up having set the 17th and 21st fastest times respectively.
Romain’s second run kicked off with around an hour left to run, the Frenchman using a scrubbed set of medium compound tyres and again focusing on race setup. His reactions were called into play once more to recover from a big moment on the entry to turn 8 – despite taking to the grass there was no damage to the car and Romain went on to complete his 4 lap run.
No sooner had Romain returned to the pits than Kimi made his way back out onto the circuit for a short run of just 2 laps on a fresh set of medium compound tyres. The next stint for both drivers came almost immediately afterwards, with each sporting the soft compound tyre for the first time and producing almost identical lap times.
After a raft of setup changes, particularly for Kimi, subsequent runs saw the drivers once again trading times in very close unison as the session drew to a close. Kimi ended the day in P13 with a best time of 1:37.836 from 30 laps, with Romain close behind in P15 after setting a fastest time of 1:37.972 from 26 laps.
Once again with new parts being tested and race setup the priority, the true pace of the E20 here in China has yet to be demonstrated. All eyes now turn to Saturday’s action…
Kimi Raikkonen – 13th: “It’s not often that you have a perfect car on Friday and there are certain things we have to improve. To be honest, it doesn’t matter if you are the slowest car on Friday if you are fast for the rest of the weekend. We now just need to look at the information and change the usual things on the car to improve it. We’re aiming for better results than what we’ve achieved from the last two weekends. For sure, we have some work to do on the car. We tried some different things with the set-up today so we have some information to look at, and we know there are certain areas where we have to improve.”
James Allison, Technical Director: “We spent today trying to make the E20 good for the race and tomorrow we’ll look at ultimate qualifying pace. The morning session was damp and drizzly, and the afternoon was a bit cold. We’re not certain that today will be representative of the race conditions we’ll see. We didn’t find a balance that either driver was happy with today, but we experienced a similar Friday scenario in Albert Park and Sepang and managed to get the cars sorted for Saturday.”
Second practice:
Pos--Driver---------------Team-------------------Time---------------Laps 1. Michael Schumacher Mercedes 1m35.973 32 2. Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes 1m36.145s + 0.172 29 3. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1m36.160s + 0.187 26 4. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m36.433s + 0.460 23 5. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m36.617s + 0.644 30 6. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m36.711s + 0.738 27 7. Kamui Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari 1m36.956s + 0.983 28 8. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes 1m36.966s + 0.993 30 9. Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1m37.191s + 1.218 30 10. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m37.316s + 1.343 32 11. Sergio Perez Sauber-Ferrari 1m37.417s + 1.444 22 12. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m37.616s + 1.643 33 13. Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 1m37.836s + 1.863 30 14. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m37.930s + 1.957 31 15. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m37.972s + 1.999 25 16. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1m38.176s + 2.203 34 17. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m38.293s + 2.320 30 18. Bruno Senna Williams-Renault 1m38.783s + 2.810 37 19. Heikki Kovalainen Caterham-Renault 1m38.990s + 3.017 36 20. Vitaly Petrov Caterham-Renault 1m39.346s + 3.373 19 21. Timo Glock Marussia-Cosworth 1m39.651s + 3.678 15 22. Pedro de la Rosa HRT-Cosworth 1m40.343s + 4.370 24 23. Charles Pic Marussia-Cosworth 1m40.753s + 4.780 30 24. Narain Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 1m41.125s + 5.162 26
The first session of the weekend here in China proved to be a frustrating affair, as intermittent drizzle limited useful running time for the team at the Shanghai International Circuit.
Tricky conditions greeted the team for the first session of the weekend here in China this morning; a mixture of dry lines and damp patches around the circuit meant that the track was too dry for intermediate tyres, but too wet in places for slicks to be effective as the green lights went out.
Nonetheless Romain launched his E20 out of the garage for an install lap around 3 minutes into the session on the green marked intermediate compound tyres. Upon the Frenchman’s return Kimi promptly joined the fray, the Finn opting for the yellow marked soft compound slick tyres as he put the car through an aero run to gather data on the new parts fitted this weekend.
Speaking of new parts, the team has brought a host of upgrades to the Shanghai International Circuit, including the latest iterations of the floor, barge board, front wing, engine cover and track rods.
After two more install laps apiece, Kimi chose to remain in the garage while Romain became one of the few drivers to set an early time, putting together a 3 lap stint on the white marked medium compound slick tyres and returning to the pits having set the 2nd fastest time at that stage in proceedings.
At around the halfway point of the session a light drizzle began to coat the tarmac, with a few drivers being caught out as conditions became increasingly greasy. One of these was Romain, who demonstrated great reflexes to save the car from a big slide through turn 3.
As the slippery conditions persisted, both drivers opted for a switch to the green marked intermediate tyres. Kimi returned to the action to set his first flying lap of the day with 25 minutes to go, followed shortly afterwards by Romain who continued to build on his earlier work.
With the track hovering at an in-between stage in terms of tyre selection, reading anything into lap times during the session would prove futile. Most of the paddock, Lotus F1 Team included, chose to run a limited programme focused on aero analysis and setup changes.
In fact, with 10 minutes left to run both cars returned to the garage and parked up for the morning; the team having decided that there was little more to be gained from running on a frustratingly variable surface.
Pos--Driver---------------Team------------------Time---------------Laps 1. Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes 1m37.106 7 2. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m38.116s + 1.010 14 3. Michael Schumacher Mercedes 1m38.316s + 1.210 14 4. Sergio Perez Sauber-Ferrari 1m38.584s + 1.478 13 5. Kamui Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari 1m38.911s + 1.805 12 6. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m38.977s + 1.871 15 7. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1m39.198s + 2.092 12 8. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m39.199s + 2.093 6 9. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m39.748s + 2.642 16 10. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m39.768s + 2.662 14 11. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m40.056s + 2.950 14 12. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m40.153s + 3.047 14 13. Valtteri Bottas Williams-Renault 1m40.298s + 3.192 8 14. Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1m40.328s + 3.222 13 15. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1m40.540s + 3.434 12 16. Heikki Kovalainen Caterham-Renault 1m41.071s + 3.965 14 17. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m41.204s + 4.098 14 18. Timo Glock Marussia-Cosworth 1m42.330s + 5.224 14 19. Giedo van der Garde Caterham-Renault 1m42.521s + 5.415 11 20. Jules Bianchi Force India-Mercedes 1m44.118s + 7.012 8 21. Pedro de la Rosa HRT-Cosworth 1m44.227s + 7.121 10 22. Charles Pic Marussia-Cosworth 1m44.500s + 7.394 15 23. Narain Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 1m47.204s + 10.098 12 24. Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 1m50.465s + 13.359 11
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