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Felipe Massa
and Kimi Raikkonen, who have
won all previous editions of
the Turkish Grand Prix, came
out of the three hours of
free practice for Sunday’s
race in eleventh and
fifteenth places
respectively. The
Brazilian’s best lap was
just over half a second
slower than the best time of
the day. He completed a
total of 60 laps, two more
than the Finn. A dirty track
and windy conditions mean
it’s even harder than usual
to analyse today’s
performance, but the two
Scuderia Ferrari drivers were happy with
their day’s work, which
covered all the usual Friday
parameters as well as being
the first opportunity to
track validate some new aero
updates. With the times
extremely close, there was
no real clue regarding what
we can expect in tomorrow
afternoon’s qualifying, but
the steady progress made
with the F60 over the past
two race weekends is
expected to continue here.
And of course, Felipe will
be keen to add to his
hat-trick of Turkish pole
positions, but it’s clear
from the current state of
play, that he will have his
work cut out.
After heavy
storms for much of
yesterday, the good weather
scheduled for the rest of
the weekend, prevailed all
day. Heikki Kovalainen ended
the day fastest for McLaren
Mercedes, ahead of Fernando
Alonso in the Renault. These
two and Nico Rosberg, who
was quickest for Williams
Toyota in the morning, were
the only men to break the 1m
29 second barrier around the
demanding Istanbul Park
anti-clockwise circuit.
Third was Robert Kubica in
the BMW, with Kazuki
Nakajima fourth for
Williams, followed by
Sebastian Vettel in the Red
Bull Renault. Jarno Trulli
completed the top six for
Toyota.
The lesson from the
first day of practice for the Turkish
Grand Prix is that everyone is closely
matched, given that the first sixteen in
the second session are all within just
over seven tenths of a second. The F60s
of Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa
covered a total of 118 laps, without
encountering any technical problems.
“Today’s results are even more difficult
to interpret than they usually are on
Fridays,” commented Stefano Domenicali.
“Apart from the normal unknowns relating
to fuel loads and tyre useage, the track
conditions also played a part, as they
changed a lot during the two sessions.
Having said that, we are reasonably
happy with the work we did today, also
taking into account our fuel loads.
There is still work to do to improve the
handling of the car, but all in all, I
think we are going in the right
direction.”
Felipe Massa:
“The track surface today was very dirty,
as could be seen by the number of
off-track excursions. As for us, we
concentrated on finding the best set-up
for Sunday’s race and it’s difficult to
say where we are compared to the rest.
On top of that, everyone is very close
in performance terms, so I think we’ll
have to wait until tomorrow morning to
understand something. The harder tyres
give little grip, as we expected, while
the softer ones seems to suffer
significant degradation, even though, as
the track evolves, that situation should
change. The new aerodynamic elements we
have here are definitely not worth a
second, but they are a small help, which
when put all together, improve our
performance.”
Kimi Raikkonen:
“At this track, conditions change very
quickly, so it is difficult to judge the
performance of the various cars on the
basis of today’s results. The track is
very dirty and, after making some
changes to the set-up, the car seemed to
handle a bit strangely, but then it was
back to normal for my final run in FP2.
There is still work to do on the car but
I am confident: I think we will find the
right solutions to be competitive
tomorrow and on Sunday.”
Chris Dyer: “It
was a rather complicated day, because of
the track conditions, it being dirty and
also because of the wind. We got through
our programme without the slightest
problem, concentrating on tyre choice
for the race, finding the best set-up on
the car and on evaluating new
aerodynamic solutions which are making
their track debut today. Both the
compounds that Bridgestone brought here
seem to be pretty critical in terms of
grip, at least from what we could see
today. But we know the situation will
improve bit by bit as the track gets
rubbered in. All in all, we are
reasonably satisfied with what we’ve
seen today. I think that again here in
Turkey, we will be able to confirm the
progress seen in Spain and Monaco.”
First Session
F. Massa: 5th 1.29.342 22 laps 276 chassis
K. Raikkonen: 7th 1.29.398 25 laps 279
chassis
Second Session
F. Massa: 11th 1.29.416 38 laps 276 chassis
K. Raikkonen: 15th 1.29.520 33 laps 279 chassis
Weather
First session: air 22/23°C, track 30/34 °C,
sunny
Second session: air 25 °C, track 41/37 °C,
sunny then partially cloudy
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