Fernando Alonso confidently registered the fastest time of the day in a surprisingly dry second practice session in Germany on Friday afternoon. Behind, the two Red Bulls sandwiched the second Ferrari of Felipe Massa as Mercedes duo Rosberg and Schumacher completed the top six. Lewis Hamilton managed seventh on the timesheets, despite being on-track for only ten minutes due to a morning accident.
Following a soaking first 90-minute session in the morning, prior to which large clouds had deposited their contents on the race track, Hockenheim – to the great surprise of all in attendance – mostly dried out as the afternoon loomed, although a threat of more rain stayed throughout second practice. Incidentally, more showers are forecast for the rest of the weekend although predictions continue to vary.
Kamui Kobayashi confirmed how slippery the surface was courtesy of a huge tank-slapper just minutes in, doing brilliantly to hold onto the Sauber exiting Turn 9 – something Adrian Sutil and Rubens Barrichello were unable to do as they spun later on in the session.
However, Sebastian Vettel had the scariest moment as he narrowly missed the barriers after running wide on turn-in to the stadium; Michael Schumacher also paid the Mobil 1 Kurve gravel trap a visit as bodywork flew off Robert Kubica’s Renault into Turn 1, which was also scene of a damaged front wing for Nico Rosberg as he clipped the markers placed on the apex.
At the sharp end, Ferrari appear to have made a step forward on a weekend which has been described as ‘crucial’ by Fernando Alonso, much like next weekend’s outing in Budapest. With a quickest lap time of 1:16.265, the Spaniard was 29 thousandths up on Vettel who, despite his best efforts, could not displace the Ferrari; their team-mates rounded the afternoon off with third and fourth as Rosberg completed the top five.
McLaren were the talking point of the day, though, with Lewis Hamilton in particular; following the 2008 winner’s sizeable accident this morning, which saw him damage both front corners plus the left-rear of his car, the Englishman was rooted to the pit lane this afternoon, finally going out with just over ten minutes remaining before climbing up to seventh for the final classification.
However, Lewis – who set the quickest second sector time – lost a huge seven tenths in the final third of the lap; it remains to be seen as to how much the gap was determined by fuel levels and how much comes from not being able to experiment with the returning blown diffuser, which was taken off the cars on Friday at Silverstone. Team-mate and fellow Champion Jenson Button finished 15th, having described his car as ‘terrible’ in the early stages of Practice 1 before then going third.
The Lotus of Jarno Trulli was the only car to stop on-track in the afternoon, with the yellow and green car grounding to a half on the inside of the hairpin as the final five minutes began.
The hour-long third and final practice session at Hockenheim begins at 11am local time on Saturday (BST +1)
Post-practice feelings from Fernando Alonso:
'Something out of the ordinary required'
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