2nd
Practice (Friday afternoon)
This morning
it was the two Ferrari's of Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa setting the
pace with World championship leader Lewis Hamilton learning the twisty
circuit, completing 10 laps and setting the fifth quickest time, with Fernando
Alonso only going out for an installation lap. This afternoon it
was Lewis Hamilton (1m12.767s) that set the fastest time ahead of his team
mate Fernando Alonso (1m12.889s). The Spaniard was 0.122s behind
despite clocking the fastest times in sectors two and three. The
"local boy" Felipe Massa (1m13.075s) was third ahead of Kimi Raikkonen
(1m13.549s). Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella (1m13.549s) took a strong
fifth place, edging out the first BMW of Robert Kubica (1m13.587s) with
the two Williams of Nico Rosberg (1m13.655s) and Alex Wurz's replacement
Kazuki Nakajima (1m13.664s) being impressive, just 0.009s slower the the
German. David Coulthard (1m13.706s) continued in form with a ninth
fastest time ahead of the second BMW of Nick Heidfeld (1m13.785s).
Lewis Hamilton who is currently under investigation by the stewards for
using one more set of wet weather tyres than permitted in the morning session
and it remains to be seen if there will be a penalty for this contravention
of the rules and if so what it will be, which of course could affect the
outcome of this weekend. It is not over until the chequered flag
on sudnay. Anything can happen between now and then. |
|
Qualifying
(3rd
practice - black) - (2nd practice elimination's
- dark blue) - (1st
practice elimination's - light blue)
.
| 1 |
|
Felipe Massa |
|
Ferrari |
|
1:11.931 |
| 2 |
|
Lewis Hamilton |
|
McLaren Mercedes |
|
1:12.082 |
| 3 |
|
Kimi Räikkönen |
|
Ferrari |
|
1:12.322 |
| 4 |
|
Fernando Alonso |
|
McLaren Mercedes |
|
1:12.356 |
| 5 |
|
Mark Webber |
|
Red Bull Renault |
|
1:12.928 |
| 6 |
|
Nick Heidfeld |
|
BMW |
|
1:13.081 |
| 7 |
|
Robert Kubica |
|
BMW |
|
1:13.129 |
| 8 |
|
Jarno Trulli |
|
Toyota |
|
1:13.195 |
| 9 |
|
David Coulthard |
|
Red Bull Renault |
|
1:13.272 |
| 10 |
|
Nico Rosberg |
|
Williams Toyota |
|
1:13.477 |
| 11 |
|
Rubens Barrichello |
|
Honda |
|
1:12.932 |
| 12 |
|
Giancarlo
Fisichella |
|
Renault |
|
1:12.968 |
| 13 |
|
Sebastian
Vettel |
|
Scuderia Toro
Rosso Ferrari |
|
1:13.058 |
| 14 |
|
Vitantonio
Liuzzi |
|
Scuderia Toro
Rosso Ferrari |
|
1:13.251 |
| 15 |
|
Ralf Schumacher |
|
Toyota |
|
1:13.315 |
| 16 |
|
Jenson Button |
|
Honda |
|
1:13.469 |
| 17 |
|
Heikki Kovalainen |
|
Renault |
|
1:14.078 |
| 18 |
|
Takuma Sato |
|
Super Aguri
Honda |
|
1:14.098 |
| 19 |
|
Kazuki Nakajima |
|
Williams Toyota |
|
1:14.417 |
| 20 |
|
Anthony Davidson |
|
Super Aguri
Honda |
|
1:14.596 |
| 21 |
|
Adrian Sutil |
|
Spyker Ferrari |
|
1:15.217 |
| 22 |
|
Sakon Yamamoto |
|
Spyker Ferrari |
|
1:15.487 |
* Engine
Change - drops 10 places on the grid
Felipe Massa
gave his home crowd what they wanted, his second successive Brazilian Grand
Prix pole position and a repeat of last years result will send the crowd
ecstatic and would not Lewis Hamilton of the Championship crown if he repeats
today´s qualifying position - second. The rookie nearly took
pole when he went fastest in the middle sector, but still managed to bump
Raikkonen down into third ahead of Fernando Alonso, who seemed to have
ruined his chances on the out lap by graining his tyres, the Current World
Champion having to put in a last minute flyer to put him ahead of the impressive
Mark Webber, putting the two BMW's of Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica behind
him with Jarno Trulli, David Coulthard and Nico Rosberg rounding up the
top ten. Once again Lewis found that perfect last lap to importantly
split the two Ferrari´s. He has a new engine against Fernando
Alonso´s second race engine (used in China), so he is in a strong
position to be the first rookie world champion tomorrow. |
|
Race
.
| 1 |
|
Kimi Räikkönen |
|
Ferrari |
|
1hr 28m 15.270 |
|
207.972 km/hr |
| 2 |
|
Felipe Massa |
|
Ferrari |
|
+ 1.4 secs |
|
|
| 3 |
|
Fernando Alonso |
|
McLaren Mercedes |
|
+ 57.0 secs |
|
|
| 4 |
|
Nico Rosberg |
|
Williams Toyota |
|
+ 1:02.8 secs |
|
|
| 5 |
|
Robert Kubica |
|
BMW |
|
+ 1:10.9 secs |
|
|
| 6 |
|
Nick Heidfeld |
|
BMW |
|
+ 1:11.3 secs |
|
|
| 7 |
|
Lewis Hamilton |
|
McLaren Mercedes |
|
+ 1 Lap |
|
|
| 8 |
|
Jarno Trulli |
|
Toyota |
|
+ 1 Lap |
|
|
| 9 |
|
David Coulthard |
|
Red Bull Renault |
|
+ 1 Lap |
|
|
| 10 |
|
Kazuki Nakajima |
|
Williams Toyota |
|
+ 1 Lap |
|
|
| 11 |
|
Ralf Schumacher |
|
Toyota |
|
+ 1 Lap |
|
|
| 12 |
|
Takuma Sato |
|
Super Aguri
Honda |
|
+ 2 Laps |
|
|
| 13 |
|
Vitantonio
Liuzzi |
|
Scuderia Toro
Rosso Ferrari |
|
+ 2 Laps |
|
|
| 14 |
|
Anthony Davidson |
|
Super Aguri
Honda |
|
+ 3 Laps |
|
|
The Ferrari's
were dominant this afternoon with Felipe Massa lead from the start until
the second pit stop when Kimi Raikkonen took the honours to lead to the
chequered flag and in doing so becoming the world champion by one point.
At the start he had tucked in behind Felipe Massa, overtaking Lewis Hamilton
and this upset the rookie, whose team mate Fernando Alonso moved onto the
inside line overtaking Hamilton, who probably made the mistake by trying
to reverse the position with an overtaking manouvre on the outside.
This led to an off and a drop to seventh before he recovered. Very
shortly afterwards on lap 8 Hamilton was out of luck again when a gearbox
glitch lost him 30 seconds and put him down to 18th place. A spirited
fight back and helped by some retirements meant that he finished in 7th
place, despite a third pit stop for a short stint on the soft rubber, two
place below the magical fifth place needed. The team said afterwards
that this third stop had gained them 10 seconds so it was not a bad team
strategy. Fernando Alonso dropped away from the two Ferraris, his
2 race engine said to be down on power. Nico Rosberg had a great
race and indeed the interest probably revolved around him and the two BMW`s
of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld with Jarno Trulli always looking dangerous,
who managed to take the last point. Kazuki Nakajima managed to finish
tenth behind David Coulthard in his first Formula 1 race, the Japanese
managing to run over a couple of the Williams mechanics during his pit
stop, luckily without either of them being seriously injured. Kimi
Raikkonen was probably the most appropriate winner for the world championship
title this year especially in view of the infighting at the McLaren camp

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