The rain
that arrived on Thursday in the Baden Wuerttenberg
region that is home to the Hockenheimring was still at
the track yesterday, mainly in the morning, when the
first ninety minutes of practice was held either in the
rain or at least on a damp track. The second free
practice session was held under ominous clouds, but
apart from a few drops, it held off long enough for
teams to carry out a proper evaluation of the dry
specification Bridgestone tyres.
The Scuderia Ferrari cars seemed competitive in all
track conditions, as Felipe Massa was second fastest in
the morning and third fastest in the afternoon, when his
team-mate Fernando Alonso topped the time sheet,
followed by the ever present Red Bull threat in the
shape of Sebastian Vettel. Winner of the last round at
Silverstone, Mark Webber, was fourth fastest in the
other Red Bull, with Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher
in their Mercedes finishing fifth and sixth to ensure
there were three German drivers in the top six for their
home race.
Needless to say, the changing weather made for a very
busy, but somewhat erratic practice, but the Scuderia
concentrated on its programme, which included evaluating
some components on the F10, as part of the policy of
introducing updates at every race. Despite yesterday’s
good showing, the Scuderia is keeping its feet firmly on
the ground, as the changing track conditions made it
even harder than usual to understand what all the teams
were doing and timing runs dependent on the weather made
a big difference to lap times. At the moment, there is
no reason to believe that Red Bull will not be the
dominant force in this afternoon’s grid-deciding
qualifying session, but it is equally clear the Fernando
and Felipe should definitely put up a good fight.
With the generally stormy weather affecting the area,
accurate predictions are hard to come by, but the
current status is that the rain tyres could be required
in this morning’s final free practice session, but for
the rest of the weekend, they can stay at the back of
the garage. Either way, the fact the Hockenheim lap is
quite short – Fernando’s quickest one yesterday only
took 1.16.265 – means that the whole field will be very
closely matched, so that everything will have to work
perfectly for qualifying as the slightest slip-up can
mean the difference between a place on the front row or
something much further down the order.
Stefano Domenicali: “Rain was the main
feature of this Friday in Hockenheim. The first session
was run almost entirely on a wet track, while rain
threatened for much of the second one, finally arriving
a few minutes after the chequered flag. The two Scuderia
Ferrari drivers completed a total of 114 laps: 50 for
Fernando Alonso, who set the fastest time of the day
overall and 64 for Felipe Massa, second fastest this
morning in the wet. It is always best to start a race
weekend in this fashion, but we are perfectly aware that
today’s results are even less meaningful than usual,”
commented
“Furthermore, at the last two races, we have seen our
drivers in the top places on Friday afternoon and
everyone knows how it ended up. But superstition apart,
we wanted to get through our planned programme and we
did so, despite the weather which was very changeable.
Now we have to work towards qualifying, which I expect
to be very closely contested and then the race. From
what we have seen so far, the Red Bull is still the
quickest car, but we are competitive."
Fernando Alonso: “We have seen before
on Fridays that we are very competitive and then on
Saturday, the Red Bulls are clearly quicker, so we have
to take this result with a grain of salt: in order to be
in front, we will have to do something out of the
ordinary. [The] changeable weather made for a different
day to usual, making it even harder to get a true
picture of the hierarchy among the teams: you only had
to use the softs five minutes later to gain half a
second. We concentrated on our work and now we have to
analyse the data to be as well prepared as possible for
qualifying and the race. In terms of set-up we are on
the right road, although we need to improve the balance
of the car. With these track conditions, combined with
quite low temperatures, it is important to be very
careful with the tyres, so as not to ruin them
immediately, especially the softs, so as to be able to
evaluate their degradation for the race. From what we
could see, there are no particular surprises in store.”
Felipe Massa: “A good start to the
weekend here in Hockenheim, but it is still much too
soon to say where we are compared to our main opponents.
The changing weather conditions will play an important
role and we must be as well prepared as possible to
tackle the various possible scenarios: for example if
qualifying takes place in the wet and the race in the
dry. It will be important to understand the behaviour of
the tyres and from what we can gather in similar
conditions, the softs are pretty good, while the hards
are definitely too hard for this track. The latest
updates introduced on the F10 also seem to be working
well, confirming the progress made on the car. I would
like to take this occasion to congratulate Sauber on its
forty years in racing: I started my Formula 1 career
with them and I really hope they stay in this sport for
a long time.”
Chris Dyer: “It was quite a productive
day. Despite the changing weather, which definitely
didn’t help, we nevertheless managed to work through
practically all the planned programme. We have a few new
technical updates on the F10, which seem to have given
us something extra in terms of car performance. We
managed to evaluate both types of dry tyre and our
drivers felt relatively comfortable with both the hard
and the soft, and equally pleased with the car. On a
track like this, the gaps are shortened, so we can
expect a very close fight tomorrow in qualifying.
Furthermore [the] times have to be seen as less
representative than usual given the rapid change in
track conditions.”
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