Lotus Renault GP driver pairing Nick Heidfeld and Vitaly Petrov were encouraged by the pace they demonstrated at Valencia on Friday, with both men occupying top ten positions in first and second practice. Heidfeld completed a sizeable amount of laps in the afternoon to end the day ninth quickest, while Petrov rounded out the top ten, albeit half a second slower than his German team-mate.
"It was a good day, I have to say that I had my best long run ever in the afternoon session in terms of not encountering traffic; it was amazing and very good for learning about the car," Heidfeld explained. "I could make some changes from the steering wheel which was possible with having such a long run, and also it was good for learning the tyre characteristics of the new medium compound.
"The new medium tyre feels good and I’m really happy with the results from it as it has not been tested that much. I think the times at the end of FP2 give the best indication of our pace relative to our competitors. In this morning’s session, I think some other teams were running different programmes from us, so their times might have been a little misleading."
"Today we ran on both high fuel and low fuel to get a feel for the car on this circuit, and it was running well on both loads," Petrov added. "We haven’t faced any mechanical difficulties so that was also a positive to be taken from today. Both cars finished in the top 10, and so there’s every reason to be positive and look forward to making some more progress tomorrow.
"I enjoyed the new medium tyres and they weren’t performing badly. It’s clear the soft tyres are, as expected, around 1.5 seconds quicker than the mediums so we will have to perform well on these tomorrow in order to have a successful weekend."
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Vitaly Petrov
Nick Heidfeld
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| Pos. | Driver | Team | Time | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. |  F. Alonso | Ferrari | 01:37.968 | 35 |
| 2. | L. Hamilton | McLaren | 01:38.195 | 26 |
| 3. | S. Vettel | Red Bull | 01:38.265 | 31 |
| 4. | M. Schumacher | Mercedes | 01:38.315 | 30 |
| 5. | F. Massa | Ferrari | 01:38.443 | 32 |
| 6. | J. Button | McLaren | 01:38.483 | 30 |
| 7. | M. Webber | Red Bull | 01:38.531 | 26 |
| 8. | N. Rosberg | Mercedes | 01:38.981 | 33 |
| 9. | N. Heidfeld | Lotus Renault | 01:39.040 | 35 |
| 10. | V. Petrov | Lotus Renault | 01:39.586 | 27 |
| Full results | ||||
| Nick Heidfeld | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| More Nick Heidfeld photos | |||
| Vitaly Petrov | |||
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| More Vitaly Petrov photos | |||
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