F1 News, Reports and Race Results

Bottas continues to narrowly set the pace in FP2

Mercedes' Valtteri Bottas stayed in command of the timesheets in the second free practice session for the British Grand Prix on Friday.

Having already broken the existing track record in the morning, Bottas improved by more than six tenths of a second after lunch. His FP2 time of 1:28.496s was just under five hundredths faster than that set by team mate Lewis Hamilton.

The Ferrari pair of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel were next fastest. However, they were more than three tenths off the pace of both Silver Arrows. Max Verstappen was fifth fastest ahead of his Red Bull team mate Daniel Ricciardo. Renault's Nico Hulkenberg was seventh, followed by Felipe Massa (Williams), Fernando Alonso (McLaren) and Esteban Ocon (Force India).

Conditions remained overcast, gusty and cool for the second Friday practice. Hulkenberg was the first driver to set a timed lap after lunch. Ten minutes into the session it was Vettel in charge with 1:30.320s on soft tyres, already faster than his FP1 time. That was quickly bettered by his Ferrari team mate Kimi Raikkonen, and then by Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo. Mercedes were next out to play, with Hamilton immediately breaking Bottas' FP1 track record with 1:28.543s.

The first driver to go exploring off-track after lunch was Haas' Romain Grosjean who soon took to the run-off at Copse. Shortly afterwards Carlos Sainz spun off at Becketts in the Toro Rosso and onto the grass. He rejoined on the approach to the Hangar Straight, but told the team that this set of soft tyres were 'destroyed' by the mishap. He returned to the pits without setting an initial time, and lost half the session while the team repaired the floor of the STR12.

McLaren was the first team to try out the supersofts, boosting Fernando Alonso into the top five. Bottas' own first flier on the same compound put him top of the times albeit only 0.047s faster than Hamilton's earlier high water mark on the soft options. Hamilton's own response on the qualifier compound saw him slip off the track at Becketts, damaging the floor of the W08 and consigning him to pit road for repairs.

When Hamilton eventually returned to action, he had turned his attention to long distance runs, in line with the rest of the field. Sainz was one of the few drivers to improve his position, his much-delayed first flying lap good enough for 11th ahead of team mate Daniil Kvyat.

Drivers continued to have moments during the session, including Jolyon Palmer spinning through Brooklands. Ricciardo, Verstappen, Massa and Raikkonen were all caught out running through Becketts. The Finn in particular was lucky not to get his rear wheels beached in the gravel as a result of his misadventure. Meanwhile the luckless Jolyon Palmer completed only 25 laps in FP2 due to clutch problems with his Renault.

There was also a moment of drama when Verstappen attempted to cut down the inside of Massa into the final corner. He came close to losing his front wing in the process. The race stewards 'noted' the incident, saying that they would look into it further after the session. There was also a late spat between Ricciardo and Grosjean, the Aussie voicing displeasure with the Haas driver's driving line as the chequered flag came out.

British Grand Prix - Free Practice 2 results

Pos Driver Team Time Gap Laps
1 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 1:28.496s 31
2 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:28.543s + 0.047s 35
3 Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 1:28.828s + 0.332s 36
4 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1:28.956s + 0.460s 36
5 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:29.098s + 0.602s 32
6 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull 1:29.586s + 1.090s 35
7 Nico Hülkenberg Renault 1:29.936s + 1.440s 37
8 Felipe Massa Williams 1:30.006s + 1.510s 36
9 Fernando Alonso McLaren 1:30.238s + 1.742s 28
10 Esteban Ocon Force India 1:30.383s + 1.887s 42
11 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso 1:30.555s + 2.059s 26
12 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:30.562s + 2.066s 34
13 Sergio Pérez Force India 1:30.624s + 2.128s 43
14 Romain Grosjean Haas 1:30.661s + 2.165s 33
15 Lance Stroll Williams 1:30.695s + 2.199s 37
16 Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren 1:30.782s + 2.286s 31
17 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:30.835s + 2.339s 33
18 Jolyon Palmer Renault 1:30.879s + 2.383s 25
19 Marcus Ericsson Sauber 1:31.616s + 3.120s 27
20 Pascal Wehrlein Sauber 1:31.929s + 3.433s 30

 
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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.

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