United States GP: Williams finds improvement in FP2


Bruno Senna

By Andrew Hooper
November 17 2012

The second Friday practice session for the 2012 United States GP would see both Williams F1 drivers improving with Bruno Senna finishing in eighth and Pastor Maldonado twelfth.

 
 United States GP Friday 2nd Practice
 
Senna
 
The second Friday practice session for the 2012 United States Grand Prix would see Williams F1 drivers Pastor Maldonado and Bruno Senna rake to the track early looking to improve on their earlier pace. Quickly the drivers would get down to setting times and after five minutes Pastor would be sixth with a 1m:48.678. Fastest at this point was Vettel with a 1m:40.790, with Ricciardo second. The traffic was heavy but Vettel would pit after just three laps. In his pit his mechanics were seen investigating an issue with his car as Alonso went fastest with a 1m:40.431 but his time would be beaten by Rosberg with a 1m:40.096. Webber was now second followed by Alonso and Hamilton.

Rosberg would improve with a 1m:39.842 as again we would see drivers running wide including Hamilton at Turn one. Massa would go second as Vettel got out of his car as his mechanics continued to work on it. With thirty minutes of the session completed it would be Webber's turn to go fastest with a 1m:39.485, while Petrov would spin at Turn one. Drivers would start to run on the medium tyre with Petrov, Kovalainen, and Pic first out on them. Webber would improve with a 1m:39.277 while for Williams Bruno was down in fourteenth with a 1m:41.583. Webber was now 0.213 ahead of Alonso in second, with Rosberg third, Button fourth and Massa in fifth. Massa would improve to be fifth with a 1m:39.710 as Vettel dropped to tenth.

More drivers would swap to the option tyre with Pastor spinning at Turn nineteen but he would continue. With an hour of the session Bruno was down in fifteenth with a 1m:41.214 as Vettel finally returned to the track. With twenty minutes remaining Bruno would use the option tyre to good effect setting a 1m:39.531 to be eighth while Pastor was some way off Bruno's pace down in seventeenth with a 1m:41.365. Despite being in his pit for a considerable time Vettel was able to still go quickest with a 1m:37.718, 0.757 ahead of Webber with Alonso third. Hamilton and Button were fourth and fifth as drivers started longer runs late in the session looking at their race pace.

For Pastor his session would end slightly early as he would slow and coast back into his pit. His mechanics would have to finish pushing his car back as he was told to switch off his engine. It was later confirmed that he had an engine issue but that the engine was to be changed anyway.

At the end of the session Bruno would remain eighth while Pastor had improved with a 1m:40.230 to be twelfth. Both drivers had made progress over their earlier pace in the day. Now it would come down to whether the team can find any further pace in their over night evaluations..
 
Maldonado
  
Pos Driver         	  Team		       Time      Laps
 1. Sebastian Vettel      Red Bull-Renault     1m37.718s 17
 2. Mark Webber           Red Bull-Renault     1m38.475s 36
 3. Fernando Alonso       Ferrari              1m38.483s 35
 4. Lewis Hamilton        McLaren-Mercedes     1m38.748s 31
 5. Jenson Button         McLaren-Mercedes     1m38.786s 32
 6. Felipe Massa          Ferrari              1m39.029s 33
 7. Nico Rosberg          Mercedes             1m39.448s 32
 8. Bruno Senna           Williams-Renault     1m39.531s 38
 9. Kamui Kobayashi       Sauber-Ferrari       1m39.653s 36
10. Michael Schumacher    Mercedes             1m40.115s 30
11. Kimi Raikkonen        Lotus-Renault        1m40.166s 32
12. Pastor Maldonado      Williams-Renault     1m40.230s 35
13. Romain Grosjean       Lotus-Renault        1m40.286s 32
14. Sergio Perez          Sauber-Ferrari       1m40.326s 35
15. Daniel Ricciardo      Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m40.435s 30
16. Jean-Eric Vergne      Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m40.516s 32
17. Nico Hulkenberg       Force India-Mercedes 1m40.700s 34
18. Paul di Resta         Force India-Mercedes 1m41.430s 35
19. Heikki Kovalainen     Caterham-Renault     1m42.476s 38
20. Timo Glock            Marussia-Cosworth    1m42.652s 33
21. Vitaly Petrov         Caterham-Renault     1m42.846s 38
22. Charles Pic           Marussia-Cosworth    1m43.538s 38
23. Pedro de la Rosa      HRT-Cosworth         1m44.453s 16
24. Narain Karthikeyan    HRT-Cosworth         1m45.114s 20
 

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United States GP: Williams finds improvement in FP2
Discussion started by Williams F1 , 17/11/2012 11:37
Williams F1
17/11/2012 11:37
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