The Ferrari and Force India F1 teams have been fined for pit lane speeding after both Kimi Raikkonen and Sergio Perez were caught exceeding the 80km/h speed limit during the first practice session for the British GP.
Perez was the faster of the two, caught travelling 83.6km/h down the pit lane while Raikkonen was caught at 82.5km/h.
Ferrari has received a €300 fine and Force India will have to pay up €400.
Catch up on what happened during FP1 ahead of the British GP here.
Lewis Hamilton topped the first practice session ahead of the Hungarian Grand Prix, one tenth quicker than team mate Nico Rosberg and eight tenths faster than Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen.
Hamilton, a four time winner in Budapest, exchanged places at the top of the time sheets with Rosberg but set the fastest time at the end of the session with a 1:25.814.
The Ferraris once again came closest to the Mercedes duo continuing their run of being the best of the rest in the first practice session of a grand prix weekend. Raikkonen took the third spot and Fernando Alonso finished his practice session a further four tenths back in fourth.
Sebastian Vettel was fifth quickest for Red Bull after struggling initially with the telemetry on his RB10. McLaren’s Kevin Magnussen ended the session in sixth, ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne and Daniel Ricciardo.
Jenson Button and Felipe Massa rounded out the top 10.
Several drivers struggled with low grip across the session. The Hungaroring is nutoriously green on a Friday. Only Adrian Sutil and Marcus Ericsson suffered spins though.
Nico Rosberg topped the timesheets after the first free practice session ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix this weekend.
Formula One returns to Austria for the first time in 11 years and looks to be bringing plenty of action to the Red Bull Ring outside the small village of Spielberg.
There should be very little surprise at the fact that Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton rung in a 1-2 for Mercedes, 0.14s off Rosberg’s time of 1:11.295 posted on prime tyres. Both Hamilton and Ferrari’s Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso came within four-tenths of a second of demoting Rosberg. This may look good for Ferrari but given their lack of performance after their deceitfully good display during practice in Canada, it’s still way too early to predict anything other than a dominant Mercedes team.
Felipe Massa was fourth quickest for the Williams team, while McLaren’s Jenson Button edged ahead of the Force India duo of Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg.
Valtteri Bottas, Kevin Magnussen and Jean-Eric Vergne rounded out the top 10.
Conditions were cool and cloudy with a few drops of rain here and there throughout the session. This meant that quite a few drivers made trips off the track with many of them making their debut excursions on the Red Bull Ring. Massa, Alonso, Magnussen, Grosjean, Bianchi, Bottas, Rosberg, Hamilton, Maldonado and Kvyat all had off-excursions after either leaving their braking too late (mainly in Turn 1 and partly due to a 10 km/h tailwind) or getting sideways.
It was however Sebastian Vettel who had the biggest moment of the session after running wide at the final corner and bouncing across the grass before being pitched into a high speed spin very narrowly avoiding contact with the barrier.
Adrian Sutil’s session ended prematurely after his Sauber suffered from a broken hose and Marcus Ericsson also only completed a few laps in his Caterham CT05 before stopping at the pit lane exit with smoke coming from his car.
Your full timesheet for the second practice session is below.
We’ll be back for FP2 and please do join us on Twitter for live commentary and chat throughout the race weekend.
Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso ended set the fastest time for the first free practice session in China.
A relatively quiet session was marked with a track temperature of 18 degrees Celcius for nearly all of the 90 minutes of running. Overcast conditions around the Shanghai International circuit made it more difficult to optimise the tyre temperatures; evident by the fact that several drivers struggled front locking.
Fernando Alonso set the quickest time of the session, a 1:39:783 but it wasn’t all smooth sailing for the Ferrari team. A steering/front-suspsension issue reduced Kimi Raikkonen’s running to a solitary installation lap. New team principal Marco Mattiacci spent most of the session in the garage.
Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg was second quickest by the time the chequered flag came out and completed a total of sixteen laps. Lewis Hamilton, eighth position, completed only nine laps as his session was cut short with an unknown issue.
Felipe Nasr completed the first free practice session for Williams in place of Valtteri Bottas while Giedo van der Garde filled in for Adrian Sutil at Sauber. Marussia’s Jules Bianchi managed to set one flying lap at the end of the session as he recovered from a fuel pressure issue. The Frenchman improved to eighteenth overall on his second flying lap.
Lewis Hamilton led a Mercedes one-two at the first free practice session for the 2014 Bahrain grand prix.
The Bahrain GP celebrates its tenth appearance on the Formula 1 calendar this weekend and will host its first ever night race. The first one and a half hour practice session remained fairly uneventful throughout. There was encouraging signs from the Lotus F1 Team who managed to rack up a substantial number of laps without any issues. However, it was the Mercedes team that once again dominated the timing sheets ahead of Sunday’s third round of the 2014 F1 season.
Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari held the fastest time for a short period of time before being pushed down to third overall. Several teams ended there practice sessions before the chequered flag came out. The suggestion was that the most valuable information would be gained in the second practice session; as the condition will be more akin to what qualifying and race conditions are likely to be.
A peculiar lapse of concentration by the Ferrari team saw Fernando Alonso leave the pitlane with three medium and one soft compound tyre on his car. The Spaniard stopped his car in the pitlane and was wheeled back into the garage by his mechanics. Some familiar faces graced the paddock during FP1 from Jean Alesi to Rod Smedley who has joined the Williams team from Ferrari.
Several reserve drivers also got some track time in Bahrain. Amongst them were Felipe Nasr for Williams, Robin Frijns for Caterham and Giedo van der Garde for Sauber.
The Mercedes duo of Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton finished on top of the time sheets for the first free practice session for the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Nico Rosberg finished in P1 with a time of 1:24.781. His team mate Lewis Hamilton finished in P2 with a 1:25.230, 0.449s off the pace of his team mate. Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel finished P3 with a time of 1:25.387 and McLaren’s Jenson Button in P4 with a time of 1:25.593. Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso ended the session in P5.
With the track damp and slippery it made it nearly impossible for teams to test the new Pirelli tyre compounds for next season but that did not stop Vettel venturing out on track for two laps with them in order to obtain some data about them.
Young Daniil Kvyat was particularly impressive in the wet, finishing the session in P8 with the Toro Rosso in only his second outing for the Faenza based team.
Below is the full timing sheet for Practice 1 for the 2013 Formula 1 Petrobras Brazilian Grand Prix
Ouch! Kimi Raikkonen’s crash during the first free practice session in Korea. When asked by the team, “What happened?”, Kimi replied, “I hit the wall”. At least he cleared that up for anyone who was wondering.
Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes seem to be taking the fight to Red Bull this weekend as Hamilton made it a clean sweep of fastest times in both Friday Free Practice sessions.
Hamilton not only set the fastest times during the free practice sessions, but was also very positive about his tyre life over the longer runs while most other drivers were complaining about high degradation.
During the first free practice session, Hamilton posted a 1.39.630 to beat championship leader Sebastian Vettel by 0.037. In the second free practice session Hamilton seemed to up the ante, posting a 1.38.673 to beat Vettel by 0.108.
Hamilton’s Mercedes team mate Nico Rosberg also put in a strong performance during the free practice sessions, finishing FP2 in third only a fraction off Vettel’s time and ahead of Mark Webber in the other Red Bull.
The Ferrari’s were a little further off the pace with Felipe Massa finishing the second free practice session in 5th and Fernando Alonso in 7th place.
Kimi Raikkonen, who crashed during FP1 managed to get straight back out for the second free practice session and complete FP2 in 8th place. Click here to see the video footage of Raikkonen’s accident.
Raikkonen’s back has been an issue but reassurances from his physio are that the Iceman is good to race this weekend.
There were no repeats of Raikkonen’s accident during FP2 but both Charles Pic and Esteban Gutierrez had minor spins and Fernando Alonso also made a little trip on to the grass.
It was a little disappointing to see that there were no spectators out in the Korean grand stands during either free practice session. Such a pity that there is not more support for F1 races in Korea as this is a very interesting circuit that delivers interesting races.
Perhaps the threat of bad weather has kept spectators away but we sincerely hope that there will be more of a crowd for tomorrows FP3, qualifying and the race on Sunday.
Time sheets for both Friday free practice sessions are below.
As always we will have live commentary of FP3, qualifying and the race on Sunday on @F1_Madness. See you then!
FP1 Time sheet:
FP2 Time Sheet:
Photo Credits:
Lewis Hamilton – courtesy of Lewis Hamilton, via Twitter @LewisHamilton
Kimi Raikkonen crash – Lotus F1 Twitter Team
Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time of the first free practice session for the Singapore Grand Prix at the Marina Bay Street Circuit
Mercedes look to be back on top after the first free practice session with Lewis Hamilton setting the quickest time of the session with a 1:47.055. Red Bull’s Mark Webber finished P2 with a 1:47.420, 0.365s slower than Hamilton’s time. Webber’s team mate, Sebastian Vettel finished the session in P3, 0.830s slower than Hamilton’s P1 time. Nico Rosberg, and Lotus’ Kimi Raikkonen rounded up the top 5 in P4 and P5 respectively.
As expected, Mercedes and Red Bull are looking very strong so far. Ferrari and Lotus are quite a long way behind and its going to take something special from them to get ahead of Red Bull and Mercedes.
With this being FP1, we’ll get a better gauge of pace after FP2 later this afternoon.
You can join us for updates throughout the FP2 session later on.
Below is the full time sheet for the FP1 session:
Lewis Hamilton was quickest after FP1 at Monza ahead of the Italian Grand Prix, a fraction of a second faster than Fernando Alonso.
Alonso looked all set to beat Hamilton’s 1.25.565 but lost time in the final sector and ended the session on a 1.25.600.
Nico Rosberg showed off Mercedes’ potential at Monza by finishing the session in third place a tenth off Alonso’s time. Sebastian Vettel brought the Red Bull home less than half a tenth further back on the time sheets.
Kimi Raikkonen’s longer wheel base E21 took lots of getting used to but the Finn finished a respectable fifth after the session.
Here is the full time sheet for FP1 at Monza.
