Times improve 2nd Friday practice for WilliamsF1


JPM second

By Andrew Hooper
June 7 2002

The 2nd Friday practice for the 2002 Canadian GP would see both BMW WilliamsF1 drivers in the top six with Juan Pablo 2nd and Ralf 5th. After a slow 1st practice both drivers would improve on their times. The session would see McLaren's David Coulthard set the fastest time.

   
Canadian GP Friday 2nd Practice
 
The second Friday practice for the Canadian GP would see a track temperature of about 35. After seeing Ferrari dominate the morning session the question was will they continue. At the end of the session the answer was no. For the BMW WilliamsF1 team both drivers were in the top six with Juan Pablo second and Ralf fifth. An encouraging start to the weekend, on a track that saw them win in 2001.

Juan Pablo MOntoyaEarly in the session it would be David Coulthard who would set a time of 1m:17.906 as Raikkonen clocked 1m:17.5 to take 3rd ahead of Fisichella. McLaren-Mercedes is the fastest Michelin team at the moment. Montoya wanted to take onto the track, but he was stopped and is being pulled back into the garage now. Montoya's mechanics are working on the car and it seems there is indeed a technical glitch.

Ralf Schumacher was up into sixth, with BMW Motorsport Director Gerhard Berger stating that the WilliamsF1 cars have a lot of fuel on board. Trulli would stall his car on the track, ending his session. He would later say that his electronics failed. Michael Schumacher's car was repaired now and he would take the lead again as Villeneuve moved up into seventh.

After fifteen minutes the order was Michael Schumacher, Raikkonen (0.4), Barrichello (0.5), Coulthard (0.7), Panis (0.7), Fisichella (1.1), R Schumacher, Villeneuve, Heidfeld, Massa, Button, de la Rosa, Frentzen, Montoya, Trulli, Salo, Irvine, Sato, McNish, Bernoldi, Webber, Yoong.

The times would improve as more rubber was laid on the track. Raikkonen would move into second only 0.07 behind Michael. But it would be the turn of Ralf Schumacher to go fastest by 0.2 secs ahead of his brother. Raikkonen was now third, Panis fourth, Barrichello fifth and Montoya sixth despite having clutch problems which nearly prevented him of taking to the track. In seventh was Jacques Villeneuve showing that the work on the BAR was paying off. Pedro de la Rosa was a strong tenth as the half way point of the session was reached.

Frentzen would move up to eighth, only 0.7 secs behind the lead. Coulthard would try out a new set of tyres, while Ralf would improve his own best by another 0.269 secs. Montoya would jump to the top of the times with a lap 0.316 ahead of his team-mate. This time was already faster than last year's pole. It was looking really good for WilliamsF1 as they are usually running heavier fuel loads on Friday.

But the McLaren pair would split the WilliamsF1 drivers with first Raikkonen securing second followed by Coulthard. Four Michelin cars were leading which completely different to what we saw in the morning. Another Michelin supplied driver Toyota's Mika Salo moved up in to seventh.

As for Michael Schumacher his next clean lap leads to a final time of 1m:15.962 which is only good enough for fourth. Interestingly Schumacher's top speed was not very good in comparison to others, notably the Saubers and WilliamsF1 cars. Juan Pablo Montoya would manage to improve his sector time at T2, seeing him improve his time by 0.159 secs.

With five minutes remaining the order was Montoya, Coulthard (0.3), Raikkonen (0.4), Michael Schumacher (0.4), Ralf Schumacher (0.5), and Mika Salo (0.7). But Coulthard would take the lead by 0.136 secs, using fresh tyres, in the dying moments of the session. He was using more downforce as he was quick at T1, but slower on the straight, where he had only 321 kph compared to Montoya's 330.

Overall a good Friday practice for both WilliamsF1 drivers with both been in the top six. Based on today's time it would appear that the Michelin supplied teams have the upper hand which should see both WiliamsF1 drivers do well come Saturday qualifying.
 
Driver Team (Tyres) Time Gap Laps

01. D Coulthard McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:15.407 40
02. JP Montoya BMW.WilliamsF1 (M) 1:15.543 0.136 36
03. M Schumacher Ferrari (B) 1:15.788 0.381 41
04. K Raikkonen McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:15.946 0.539 43
05. R Schumacher BMW.WilliamsF1 (M) 1:16.018 0.611 45
06. M Salo Toyota (M) 1:16.259 0.852 39
07. O Panis BAR-Honda (B) 1:16.333 0.926 48
08. R Barrichello Ferrari (B) 1:16.440 1.033 37
09. J Villeneuve BAR-Honda (B) 1:16.448 1.041 48
10. Heinz H. Frentzen Arrows-Cosworth (B) 1:16.793 1.386 40
11. P de la Rosa Jaguar-Cosworth (M) 1:16.801 1.394 47
12. G Fisichella Jordan-Honda (B) 1:16.989 1.582 37
13. E Bernoldi Arrows-Cosworth (B) 1:17.018 1.611 28
14. N Heidfeld Sauber-Petronas (B) 1:17.250 1.843 48
15. J Button Renault (M) 1:17.473 2.066 34
16. F Massa Sauber-Petronas (B) 1:17.489 2.082 54
17. E Irvine Jaguar-Cosworth (M) 1:17.765 2.358 42
18. M Webber Minardi-Asiatech (M) 1:18.034 2.627 36
19. T Sato Jordan-Honda (B) 1:18.143 2.736 34
20. A McNish Toyota (M) 1:18.311 2.904 34
21. J Trulli Renault (M) 1:18.465 3.058 19
22. A Yoong Minardi-Asiatech (M) 1:19.050 3.643 56
 
 
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