Canadian GP: Quickest times in Practice sessions help Jenson Button and Sebastian Vettel
Vettel posted the quickest time of the day while defending champion Jenson Button seized the top spot in first practice session which helped him in the main race on Sunday in Canada. Vettel who dominated the second session with his soft tyres made amends for his below par performance in first session.
In the first practice session, defending champion Jenson Button posted the quickest time where as legendary Michael Schumacher came in second while Button’s teammate and fellow English Hamilton clinched the third place. McLaren proved their credentials when they dominated the opening session of practice at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal. Button posted a time of one minute and 18.127 seconds. Schumacher also made an immediate mark on the proceedings as he came in second for the Mercedes Team.
Schumacher has the best record at Canadian Grand Prix by winning seven times at Montreal. Schumacher showed his familiarity and comfort with the circuit when he posted the second quickest time, only 0.158 seconds adrift of Button’s time. Hamilton came third with 0.225 seconds behind Button while Nico Rosberg finished fourth with Mercedes. The most distinguished absence came from the Red Bull team who failed to finish in the top four despite the fact that they started all seven races of the season on pole position. Sebastian Vettel finished fifth with 0.4222 seconds behind leader where as his teammate and driver’s championship leader Mark Webber came disappointingly 14th, almost 1.5 seconds behind Button. The 4.361 km circuit is considered ideal for cars like McLaren and Renault. McLaren fully capitalized on their leverage where as Renault failed to fully make something out of the circuit. Robert Kubica finished much better with over half a second behind Button relative to his team-mate Vitaly Petrov who finished 13th on his first appearance at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.
However, second session was completely different story as Red Bull Racing regained their domination when Sebastian Vettel posted the quickest time of the day in the second outing. It is also a morale booster for Vettel, who was knocked out of the Turkish Grand Prix by his Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber when they collided in Istanbul two weeks ago. Vettel who is 15 points behind Webber in championship table made a strong statement regarding his contention with this performance. Vettel posted the day’s quickest time of 1 minute and 16.877 seconds to finish on top spot. Vettel strategy to use soft tyres was successful as he outmanoeuvred his opponents who were hampered by acute tyre wear.
Talking after the practice session, Vettel said, “It’s looking for us, we are quite competitive. The secret here is the tyres; everyone was sliding around a bit, we only made small adjustments between the two sessions.” Two-time Formula 1 (F1) Champion Fernando Alonso made up for his early disappointment when he came second just 0.0086 seconds behind Vettel. Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg continued his fine form when he improved on his previous run to finish third. Red Bull Racing’s other driver Mark Webber came fourth, also improving on his previous session.
Australian Mark Webber commenting on his performance said, “We thought McLaren might do more, but it is early in the weekend. We are pretty happy with how the day went. I think we were pleasantly surprised with the pace, which is good thing for us.” Brazilian Felipe Massa also improved on his early outing by posting fifth quickest time. On the other hand, Lewis Hamilton could not continue his first session form as he finished seventh behind Force India’s driver Adrian Sutil. Like most drivers, Hamilton was also the victim of tyre wear. Robert Kubica concluded a disappointing day for Renault as he finished 8th. Seven-time champion Michael Schumacher failed to post another impressive time as he finished 9th while Vitantonio Liuzzi became the second driver for Force India to finish in the top 10. Jenson Button, who was fastest in the morning session ended the day with mixed feelings as he finished the second session on the 11th spot.
Now all the eyes are on qualifying as drivers get ready to a take their practice session form into qualifying. It would be interesting to see whether Red Bull will start the race on pole position as they have done in seven previous occasions or it’s McLaren who wants to have a head start before the actual race.
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