European GP: Review Fridays’ First Qualifying Session
Friday’s practice session at the Valencia Circuit in Spain brought some real unexpected results. In the past few days a lot of hype has been created about the Red Bull, the McLaren team and the Ferrari but it was the Mercedes GP that took the lead at the first practice session in the European Grand Prix. Nico Rosberg stood out as the driver who finished in the fastest time with 1m 41.175s. Following him was Lewis Hamilton of McLaren who ended 0.164s seconds short of Nico with the total time of 1m 41.339s. Hamilton is the man who is expected to give the toughest time on the final day of the race as he had been able to win the last two races pretty neatly. Although he owes the Turkish win to the Red Bull’s crash, but still he is at a very good form this season. At the third place his teammate Jenson Button finished, who has ended 0.208s short of him in a total of 1m 41.383s. The last two races have been finished by him at second place both times and also he is expected to give a good race this weekend as well.
The Renault’s man, Robert Kubica finished at the fourth place in 1m 41.715s making it 0.540s slower than the race leader Rosberg.
Last year it was Sebastian Vettel who took pole here, in 1m 39.489s with a first-stint fuel load, whereas, the fastest ‘light fuel’ lap in the second qualifying last year was taken by Rubens Barrichello of Brawn Team in 1m 38.000s.
However, this year’s session was covered by Vettel in 1m 42.216s thus marking the sixth place for himself, one place shy of Felipe Massa who recorded 1m 42.182s, which marked the fastest Ferrari time.
Following him were the two Red Bull drivers, Vettel and Mark Webber, who had earlier been very happy and confident with their cars. They covered in 1m 42.216s and 1m 42.275s respectively.
The man who had not returned happy from the Canadian Grand Prix earlier this month Michael Schumacher, of Mercedes GP, enveloped in 1m 42.312s ending at the eighth place. Schumacher’s team as well as his fans wish to see a very good racing display from him here as he had not been able to do very good since the beginning of the year, after his return to the track following a gap of three years. In 2007, Schumacher announced his retirement from the sport but came back to join this season with the Mercedes GP team.
Fernando Alonso of Ferrari ended at the ninth place with 1m 42.421s and was followed by the two Williams’ drivers, Barrichello and Nico Hulkenberg with the time of 1m 42.463s and 1m 42.707s marking tenth and eleventh places respectively.
The other Renault driver, Vitaly Petrov finished in 1m 42.962s whereas the Toro Rosso driver, Sebastien Buemi, who had been in news earlier this month for being in danger of his seat in the team, concluded at thirteenth place and was chased by Vitantonio Liuzzi of the Force India team who covered in 1m 43.380s. The BMW Sauber’s driver Pedro de la Rosa ended in 1m 43.397s whereas Paul di Restaon 1m 43.437s. Kamui Kobayashi completed with 1m 44s.
The eighteenth place was claimed by Jaime Alguersuari, for Red Bull’s second team Toro Rosso, in 1m 44.183s, while Timo Glock stood next to Heikki Kovalainen, both ending in 1m 45.653s and 1:44.491 time respectively.
Bruno Senna stood twenty first in 1m 47.123s followed by the Lotus’ Jarno Trulli with 1m 47.285s. The second last and last places of the qualifying session were taken by Christian Klien for HRT and Lucas di Grassi of Virgin on 1m 47.343s and 1m 47.356s in the order.
There were a few minor offs but no serious damages were seen in the entire race duration, besides the left rear-view mirror lost by Senna after the thirty sixth minute.
Well, more action is to be expected on the track as the next practice lap follows and then there is the Saturday’s session yet to come before we witness the final race on Sunday.
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