Username
Password
Friday Practice Review
By Catherine Black
September 13 2008
The first two opening practices for the Italian Grand Prix at Monza were held in wet conditions, with the first practice session being washed out five minutes before the session finished, and the second free practice session allowed for some dry running later on in the session.

Rain greeted the teams for the opening day of the final European round of the 2008 championship, at Monza on Friday.

During free practice one, teams were forced to run on either intermediate tyres or wet tyres, which meant that they got no dry running during the one and a half hour session. As a result, the number of laps that were completed by Scuderia Toro Rosso was limited to 33 laps between the two drivers, with Sebastien Bourdais completing the most laps (20). The session was red flagged five minutes from the end of the session as a thunderstorm flooded the track.

Free practice two finally saw some dry running for the teams after about 30 minutes, when the track dried up. Sebastien Bourdais was the first driver to go out on dry tyres to test the track with a time of 1 min 32 seconds, which was lowered throughout the session. Free practice two saw 74 laps being covered by the two Scuderia Toro Rosso drivers, as they prepared for qualifying and the race.

Sebastian Vettel:

"Because of the rain, we did not get all of our programme completed in the way we would have wished, but that's the same for everyone. All in all, it was a good day in tricky conditions, as we finished with both cars in one piece! Our test here before Spa has helped us a lot, even though the track has obviously changed with the weather, so in these conditions, today it was mainly a case of getting a feel for the tyres and the circuit. Overall, we can be fairly happy. Like last weekend it seems the big unknown will be the weather."

Sebastien Bourdais:

"The track was very tricky this afternoon as there were still some damp patches. This morning in the wet, I would say we looked quite competitive and I was reasonably happy with the car. However, in the in-between and dry track conditions, I felt less comfortable and the rear of the car was moving around a lot and I was struggling a little bit. But there should be more rubber down tomorrow which will help. We tried a few set-up changes but I am not yet sure if they were a step in the right direction."

Free Practice One Results:

Pos

Driver

Team

Time

Gap

Laps

1

Adrian Sutil

Force India-Ferrari

1:32.842

18

2

Rubens Barrichello

Honda

1:33.428

0.586

14

3

Giancarlo Fisichella

Force India-Ferrari

1:33.695

0.853

19

4

Timo Glock

Toyota

1:36.800

3.958

13

5

Nico Rosberg

Williams-Toyota

1:36.900

4.058

9

6

Fernando Alonso

Renault

1:36.965

4.123

10

7

Sebastien Bourdais

STR-Ferrari

1:37.142

4.300

20

8

Jarno Trulli

Toyota

1:37.214

4.372

13

9

Kimi Räikkönen

Ferrari

1:37.392

4.550

5

10

Sebastian Vettel

STR-Ferrari

1:37.754

4.912

13

11

Nelsinho Piquet

Renault

1:38.057

5.215

11

12

David Coulthard

Red Bull-Renault

1:38.303

5.461

7

13

Jenson Button

Honda

1:39.062

6.220

12

14

Felipe Massa

Ferrari

1:40.233

7.391

5

15

Nick Heidfeld

BMW Sauber

No Time

1

16

Kazuki Nakajima

Williams-Toyota

2

17

Robert Kubica

BMW Sauber

1

18

Heikki Kovalainen

McLaren-Mercedes

1

19

Mark Webber

Red Bull-Renault

1

20

Lewis Hamilton

McLaren-Mercedes

 

 

1

Free Practice Two Results

Pos

Driver

Team

Time

Gap

Laps

1

Kimi Räikkönen

Ferrari

1:23.861

 

31

2

Robert Kubica

BMW Sauber

1:23.931

0.070

26

3

Nick Heidfeld

BMW Sauber

1:23.947

0.086

29

4

Lewis Hamilton

McLaren-Mercedes

1:23.983

0.122

25

5

Nico Rosberg

Williams-Toyota

1:24.110

0.249

33

6

Felipe Massa

Ferrari

1:24.247

0.386

34

7

Heikki Kovalainen

McLaren-Mercedes

1:24.365

0.504

29

8

Mark Webber

Red Bull-Renault

1:24.521

0.660

35

9

Adrian Sutil

Force India-Ferrari

1:24.669

0.808

22

10

Sebastian Vettel

STR-Ferrari

1:24.773

0.912

35

11

David Coulthard

Red Bull-Renault

1:25.100

1.239

25

12

Sebastien Bourdais

STR-Ferrari

1:25.192

1.331

39

13

Giancarlo Fisichella

Force India-Ferrari

1:25.204

1.343

24

14

Rubens Barrichello

Honda

1:25.296

1.435

25

15

Jenson Button

Honda

1:25.309

1.448

34

16

Kazuki Nakajima

Williams-Toyota

1:25.330

1.469

28

17

Timo Glock

Toyota

1:25.397

1.536

28

18

Fernando Alonso

Renault

1:25.481

1.620

22

19

Jarno Trulli

Toyota

1:25.753

1.892

29

20

Nelsinho Piquet

Renault

1:26.195

2.334

23

 

 

View a Printer Friendly version of this Story.

Bookmark or share this story with: