McLaren driver Jenson Button takes second practice session at Turkish Grand Prix: Formula 1 news
With Red Bull Racing Renault unable to get Sebastian Vettel ready, Jenson Button emerged top seed after going fastest in the second free practice session in the countdown to the Turkish Grand Prix.
The first practice period provided mixed results as rain dominated proceedings. Fernando Alonso turned out to be the opportunist who made full use of the wet conditions with Mercedes GP going strong as both their drivers slotted into 2nd and 3rd
fastest positions.
In the second and final practice session for the day, Jenson Button set a strong 1 minute 26.456 second lap to go on top of the timesheets. Mercedes GP driver, Nico Rosberg, remained consistent as he was 2nd fastest. The German was a mere seven
hundredths of a second slower than the McLaren on top. The second McLaren featuring Lewis Hamilton went 3rd quickest. Michael Schumacher made it a double McLaren – Mercedes GP sandwich by going fourth fastest.
Mark Webber looked a touch off the pace as he took the 5th fastest time. The Australian’s fastest lap was a 1 minute 27.149- effectively more than half a second over the best time.
Felipe Massa proved to be one of the busiest drivers on track as he went 27 times around the Istanbul Park Circuit. The encouraging thing for the Brazilian driver after all that hard work was that he went quicker than his teammate Fernando Alonso.
The Spaniard, after dominating the first practice session, had a quiet second stint as he went 11th fastest after doing 27 laps- a sign that the former world champion was conserving his machinery seeing that Sebastian Vettel got to lay back in
the pit garage as his Red Bull was being repaired. Having said that, it also meant that since conditions were wet in the first practice session, the lack of dry time might compound the German’s problems.
Renault’s Vitaly Petrov posted the 8th fastest time. Both Force India drivers were bisected by Sauber’s Sergio Perez as the former went 8th and 10th fastest on the day.
With the final practice session and qualifying to follow, a lot could change before the start of the race.
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