British Grand Prix: Red Bull’s Mark Webber leads practice at Silverstone
After all the speculation ahead of the British Grand Prix, it was Mark Webber who headed the practice on Friday at the Silverstone circuit. However, Ferrari and McLaren showed enough evidence to prove that Red Bull may be in for a fight at this weekend’s race.
Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso was 2nd quickest and lagged 0.392 seconds behind Mark Webber, followed closely by Webber’s teammate, Sebastian Vettel.
Ferrari’s new exhaust seems to be working quite well at Silverstone, as their 2nd driver, Felipe Massa, was close in on 4th. Behind him was Nico Rosberg from Mercedes, with his teammate Michael Schumacher in 6th position.
It was a disappointing day, though, for the two home drivers, McLaren’s Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, who finished 13th and 8th respectively. But Webber said he does not read too much into the practice session, and believes that McLaren will show their pace on Qualifying.
McLaren were trying to check raft of several new parts during practice to see if the modification would be fitting at the Silverstone circuit. The British duo is expected to give the Red Bulls a good run for their money this weekend.
Even though McLaren were trying out various variations during the practice session, it was not clear whether they were successful in their tests or not. Red Bull still remains favourites to win the race.
Webber and Vettel were miles ahead of others every time they made their way on the tracks, and Webber’s lap of 1 minute 31.234 seconds was by far the quickest of the day.
After the session, Webber said that the practice session had been more than satisfying for him, but the minor electrical fault at the end was disappointing.
Webber said that they did miss some laps, but overall the performance of both cars was convincing.
The Australian added that there are some teams that are making plans to counter the Red Bulls, but all Red Bull need to do is stick with their own strategy and there will be no problems.
Webber went on to say that McLaren were not revealing their plans to everyone and were very secretive, and he believes that they will unveil their plans on qualifying.
McLaren’s new plans include front wing development and changes to the blown diffuser, that helps increase the down-force and is efficient when turning on sharp corners. The exhaust gases are directed to the floor of the car.
Williams are also using the blown diffuser at Silverstone for the first time, whereas Mercedes, who introduced it 2 races ago but had to abandon it as the rear of the car was getting overheated, have reinstalled it with extra insulation put around the back of the car.
Ferrari used the European Grand Prix at Valencia to introduce their version of the diffuser. The Italian team were looking to analyse the F-duct aerodynamic device. The F-duct was introduced to F1 by McLaren this season; it helps on long straights.
Ferrari has decided to use the diffuser for the qualifying and the race, after testing the car first with the system and later without it during the practice session.
Alonso seemed very optimistic after qualifying, and said that he is very confident that the upgrades will help him and Massa to a great extent this weekend, and there is hardly any difference between the Ferraris and Red Bulls from here on.
Alonso added that admittedly, at the moment Red Bull are ahead, but on a race day anything can happen, and on a track like Silverstone, the corners may prove to be most critical, as the long straights will not test the diffusers as much, but when it comes to sharp corners, whoever uses the new system the best will come out on top.
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