It’s over three weeks
since Formula 1 cars were last in action at the
Hungaroring, but as could be expected, the break has not
had a radical effect on the pecking order in the
paddock. Yesterday, at the end of the first day of free practice
for the twelfth round of the World Championship, a Red
Bull Racing car topped the time sheet, followed by a
Ferrari and a McLaren. Mark Webber was quickest after
the three hours on track, nearly all of it held in the
rain, or at least on a wet surface. Behind came the
first of the 150º Italia’s courtesy of Fernando Alonso,
with Jenson Button completing the top trio. Felipe Massa
was fifth in the other Ferrari, behind the McLaren of
Lewis Hamilton and ahead of Nico Rosberg in the
Mercedes.
No one was surprised to see that rain was on the agenda,
as it is the most famous of the Spa Francorchamps
clichés, but even by Belgian Grand Prix standards, the
way the weather switched from dry to wet in the morning
and then did the same all over again in the afternoon
was quite unusual. It meant that evaluating the two
types of dry weather tyre brought here by Pirelli had to
be crammed into a very small window of opportunity.
Equally difficult was getting a clear picture of the
benefits of the new parts brought here to Belgium.
Nevertheless, both Fernando and Felipe said they were
happy with the behaviour of their 150º Italias, which
seem to be well balanced around the seven kilometres of
the longest track on the calendar. Both cars ran trouble
free throughout Friday. And speaking of clichés,
Felipe, a real fan of the Belgian circuit, pointed out
that Eau Rouge, generally considered one of the most
fearsome corners on the calendar is now “almost a
straight!” One new driver on the grid: Bruno Senna
replaced Nick Heidfeld at Lotus Renault and the
Brazilian ended the day in seventeenth place.
More rain is forecast for today: will it affect
qualifying in the afternoon, will race day be dry? As
usual, nothing at Spa-Francorchamps is ever clear cut,
which all adds to the appeal of this charismatic venue.
Fernando
Alonso: “Even if I only
managed a few laps in the dry, my initial feeling is
positive: the car is well balanced and there are no
major changes needed for the rest of the weekend. Sure,
it’s always difficult to get a complete picture after a
day like this, but as I said at the start, we have got
off on the right foot. That is important because it’s
never nice to have to make a major set-up change from
Friday to Saturday, thus tackling the second day almost
in the dark. Our main opponents were also very strong,
from the little we could see: the Red Bull had a great
top speed and was still quickest in the second sector,
which shows good all-round performance and McLaren also
looked good. Michael? I don’t know him well enough to be
able to talk about him as a person, but he has left a
significant mark at Maranello and this means a lot. As a
driver, he is a legend: maybe these days he comes in for
criticism in the press, but wherever we go, he is still
a major attraction and the people shout his name, which
shows how popular he is.”
Felipe Massa: “It’s hard to make much
sense of such a strange day: first it was dry, then wet
and then it repeated itself. Luckily, at least we
managed to try both types of slick tyre brought here by
Pirelli, even if just for a few laps. Along with the
engineers, we will have to try and interpret the data in
the best way possible to make the right choices: in any
case, first impressions, from what I can tell, are
positive. We have some new parts and I think we will use
them for the rest of the weekend, because they have
allowed us to improve our performance. Where we are
compared to the others, we will only know tomorrow in
qualifying. I really like this track a lot: maybe it’s
lost some of its excitement in some corners, such as Eau
Rouge, which is now practically a straight, but it is
still great to drive a Formula 1 car on a track like
this.”
Pat Fry: “We had a lot on our plate, in
the form of a packed work schedule, evaluating new
components and we tried to get through it as efficiently
as possible, even though we were up against less than
ideal weather conditions. Obviously, if the track had
been dry it would have been better, however we still
managed to gather a substantial amount of data which we
can now work through calmly. But this is Spa, so we were
hardly expecting stable weather! Some of the solutions
we brought here seem to deliver positive results, while
we need to look at others in more detail and that’s what
we will do between now and tomorrow morning, when we
will make our final choices for this race weekend. At
the moment, it’s difficult to give a verdict on the
tyres, because we managed so few laps in the dry.”
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