Monaco GP: Difficult start for Williams Martini in FP1
By Andrew Hooper
May 26 2016
The opening Thursday practice for the 2016 Monaco GP would be a difficult one for the Williams Martini team. Both drivers would finish outside the top ten with Valtteri Bottas 11th and Felipe Massa a distant 19th. The session would get off to a bad start when Felipe would crash his car at Ste Devote damaging the left front and rear suspension seeing his session come to an end. Valtteri would focus his runs on using the supersoft tyre seeing him only manage his 11th position. Valtteri would also have a major moment going through the tunnel when his car was to snap sideways, thankfully he was able to recover from this and continue.
Williams
Martini Monaco GP Thursday 1st Practice
Team Summary:
Both Williams drivers would complete their installation laps while it would
be Rosberg who would set the first time with a 1m:23.758, running on the
ultrasoft tyre. He would improve with a 1m:21.712 then a 1m:20.141 with
Hamilton second. Hamilton would improve with a 1m:18.302 with ten minutes
completed. Rosberg had set a 1m:19.192. Both Mercedes cars would continue to
run with Hamilton improving with a 1m:17.381 and Rosberg second followed by
Kvyat. Both Williams cars were back out on the track running on the
supersoft tyre.
Hamilton continued to improve with a 1m:16.588 with both Mercedes cars
pitting. After their first runs Felipe and Valtteri were both third and
sixth. Felipe would crash at Ste Devote ending his session. He was sixth but
would expect to drop down the order. Ricciardo was now second, 1m:16.764,
followed by Verstappen and Kvyat. As other drivers set times Felipe and
Valtteri would drop to twelfth and sixteenth. After a quick pit stop
Valtteri would come back out improving to be third, dropping to fourth.
Felipe was now fourteenth.
With fifty minutes remaining the order was Hamilton, Ricciardo, Verstappen,
Vettel, Sainz, Hulkenberg, Valtteri, Kvyat, Raikkonen and Perez. With forty
minutes run the track would clear as drivers came back in to hand in their
first set of tyres. Hamilton and Rosberg were again back out running on the
ultrasoft tyre. Rosberg was now second with a 1m:16.585 but he would set a
1m:15.835 to go quickest. But Hamilton would again move to the top of the
times with a 1m:15.537. Hamilton would have a major lockup at Ste Devote
ruining the tyres. For Williams Valtteri was on a long run on the soft tyre.
Verstappen was now third running on the ultrasoft tyre with Ricciardo fourth
and Kvyat fifth. There was a real mix of tyre types being used during the
session. Raikkonen would move up to ninth and Sainz tenth seeing Valtteri
drop to eleventh. As the session continued drivers would complete longer
runs on a range of tyres. It would be red flagged when a drain cover was to
come off and come up and hit the McLaren of Button. Hamilton would finish
top of the times with Rosberg just 0.101 behind. Vettel was third followed
by Ricciardo, Verstappen, Kvyat, Hulkenberg, Perez, Raikkonen, and Sainz
tenth. It was now the best of starts for the Williams team with one car
damaged in the barriers and the other outside the top ten.
Felipe Massa:
Felipe would take to the track first for Williams running on the soft tyre.
Felipe was back out for his timed run out on the supersoft tyre. Felipe
would set a 1m:19.828 on his first lap to be third. A 1m:19.417 on his next
lap followed by a 1m:18.914. Felipe would drop to fifth with a 1m:18.746.
But for Felipe his session would see him crash at Ste Devote hitting the
barrier with his left rear then the front damaging the front and rear
suspensions. His car would be craned away seeing Felipe's session over.
Valtteri Bottas:
Valtteri would follow his team-mate out completing a single installation
lap. He was also on the soft tyre. Valtteri was also back out and would set
a 1m:23.584 on his first timed lap. Valtteri would improve with a 1m:21.352
then a 1m:19.663 to be fifth. A 1m:19.439 from Valtteri but he had dropped
to twelfth. Valtteri would pit briefly coming back out. He would set a
1m:17.741 to improve to be third but would drop to fourth. Sainz would move
ahead of Valtteri seeing him fifth. He would drop to eighth but was still on
the soft tyre. Valtteri would continue running on the supersoft tyre up
until the point where the session would be red flagged when a drain cover
would come off hitting Button's car seeing the session red flagged. Replays
would show Valtteri having a major moment that he was able to recover from
going through the tunnel when the cars snapped sideways.
Pos Driver Team Time Laps
1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m15.537s 31
2 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m15.638s 39
3 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m15.956s 26
4 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 1m16.308s 29
5 Max Verstappen Red Bull-Renault 1m16.371s 30
6 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m16.426s 37
7 Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1m16.560s 34
8 Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes 1m16.697s 28
9 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1m16.912s 24
10 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m17.130s 39
11 Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes 1m17.562s 44
12 Romain Grosjean Haas-Ferrari 1m17.599s 33
13 Fernando Alonso McLaren-Honda 1m17.838s 27
14 Esteban Gutierrez Haas-Ferrari 1m17.909s 25
15 Jenson Button McLaren-Honda 1m17.920s 26
16 Felipe Nasr Sauber-Ferrari 1m18.187s 29
17 Kevin Magnussen Renault 1m18.274s 34
18 Marcus Ericsson Sauber-Ferrari 1m18.301s 33
19 Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes 1m18.746s 10
20 Jolyon Palmer Renault 1m18.871s 22
21 Rio Haryanto Manor-Mercedes 1m20.528s 28
22 Pascal Wehrlein Manor-Mercedes 1m20.868s 25
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