AUSTRIAN GP - FREE PRACTICE #2 - RE-CAP & TIMES
He and team-mate Valtteri Bottas swapped fastest times early in the session, with Bottas the first of the pair to beat Hamilton’s FP1 effort. Hamilton finished the short runs with a time of 1m05.483s, two tenths of a second faster than his team-mate.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel split the pair, less than 0.6s faster than Bottas.
Bottas struggled with the balance of the car later in the session. He was one of a number of drivers that ran wide, spinning into the gravel trap. Though he managed to avoid the barrier and return to the track, he damaged the floor of his Mercedes, upsetting the aero balance. Mercedes opted not to change the floor, instead tweaking Bottas’ front wing.
Red Bull changed the floor to Max Verstappen in the morning practice session, which caused more problems in the afternoon. There was a problem with the brakes following the floor change, and Verstappen was confined to the pits for the first part of practice.
When he did go out, Verstappen immediately jumped up the timings to sixth. Running qualifying simulations for later than the rest of the field, he improved to fourth late on in the session, but was hampered by traffic as other drivers completed race simulations.
Team-mate Daniel Ricciardo took fifth, ahead of Kimi Raikkonen and the Haas of Kevin Magnussen.
The Red Bull Ring was not kind to the floors of F1 cars. Fernando Alonso was another driver who had limited running as the floor of his McLaren was changed. He set less than 30 laps – Vettel managed 50 – but was still able to set the seventh fastest time, a sign Honda may have made a break through with its engine update. Team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne finished 12th.
Nico Hulkenberg and Romain Grosjean completed the top 10. Esteban Ocon finished just outside the top 10 in 11th, whilst Force India team-mate Sergio Perez could only manage 17th.
Carlos Sainz also had trouble with the floor of his car, though his problems arose after he ran over kerbs, through multiple gravel traps and the grass at the edge of the circuit. He returned to the Toro Rosso garage with a damaged floor and grass lodged in his front wing. He’d already set his fastest time of the session, which put him 15th in the order.
Things didn’t end much better for Daniil Kvyat, who’s brakes caught fire during his race simulation. He finished 13th, with Williams’ Felipe Massa separating the Toro Rosso driver.
Massa struggled with his tyres throughout the session, and was more than a second and a half off the pace. Lance Stroll also struggled, finishing 16th in the order.
Jolyon Palmer’s running was once again limited as the team worked on his Renault for the majority of the session. He completed just seven laps and ended the session 18th, ahead of the Saubers of Pascal Wehrlein and Marcus Ericsson.
TIMES:
1. Lewis Hamilton - 1:05.483 / Mercedes-Mercedes / Great Britain
2. Sebastian Vettel - 1:05.630 / Ferrari-Ferrari / Germany
3. Valtteri Bottas - 1:05.699 / Mercedes-Mercedes / Finland
4. Max Verstappen - 1:05.832 / Red Bull-TAG-Heuer / Netherlands
5. Daniel Ricciardo - 1:05.873 / Red Bull-TAG-Heuer / Australia
6. Kimi Raikkonen - 1:06.144 / Ferrari-Ferrari / Finland
7. Kevin Magnussen - 1:06.591 / Haas-Ferrari / Denmark
8. Fernando Alonso - 1:06.732 / McLaren-Honda / Spain
9. Nico Hulkenberg – 1:06.735 / Renault-Renault / Germany
10. Romain Grosjean - 1:06.763 / Haas-Ferrari / France
11. Esteban Ocon - 1:06.849 / Force India-Mercedes / France
12. Stoffel Vandoorne - 1:06.859 / McLaren-Honda / Belgium
13. Daniil Kvyat - 1:06.906 / Toro Rosso-Renault / Russia
14. Felipe Massa - 1:07.065 / Williams-Mercedes / Brazil
15. Carlos Sainz - 1:07.100 / Toro Rosso-Renault / Spain
16. Lance Stroll - 1:07.468 / Williams-Mercedes / Canada
17. Sergio Perez - 1:07.509 / Force India-Mercedes / Mexico
18. Jolyon Palmer - 1:07.623 / Renault-Renault / Great Britain
19. Pascal Wehrlein - 1:08.782 / Sauber-Ferrari / Germany
20. Marcus Ericsson - 1:08.870 / Sauber-Ferrari / Sweden
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Article Written By: Bethonie Waring
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