Nico Rosberg set the fastest time in the second free practice session ahead of Sunday’s British grand prix.

The second one-and-a-half hour session is usually reserved to evaluate how the various cars will perform in race trim but it also allows for a quali sim. Pirelli have made the medium and hard compound tyre available to drivers this weekend and it already looks as if a one-stop strategy will be the order of the day. However, with weather conditions predicted to be cooler for Sunday’s race the issue of graining could come into play.

The session was red flagged early on as Romain Grosjean beached his Lotus in the gravel on the exit of Luffield. Fernando Alonso (McLaren) and Roberto Merhi (Manor) had similar incidents at the same corner but managed to recover their cars from the gravel trap. Toro Rosso underlined their morning pace with Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz Jr. ending the session seventh and ninth quickest.

Lewis Hamilton wouldve have been slightly annoyed at his afternoon as the reigning champion never quite seemed to have the Mercedes under him as he would like. His qualifying simulation lap left fourth overall nearly half a second adrift of teammate Nico Rosberg. Kimi Raikkonen’s first quick run on the medium tyres left him somewhat off the pace but the Finn was one of very few drivers to improve his time on a second flying lap. Raikkonen set a 1:34:502 some three and a half tenths of Rosberg’s time.

The long runs weren’t going much better for Hamilton who bailed out after running only five laps in the stint. Rosberg set a competitive and importantly consistent pace on the medium tyre. Sebastian Vettel was able to run close to the Mercedes pace as was Raikkonen on the hard compound tyre. The relative fuel loads at this stage of the weekend is unknown but Ferrari principal Maurizio Arrivabene said after the Austrian GP that he was “tired” of the false Friday pace Ferrari produced on race weekends.