F1 News, Reports and Race Results

Ricciardo stays fastest; FP2 hit by more red flags

Red Bull Racing's Daniel Ricciardo stayed top of the timesheets in second practice for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Ricciardo's best time in the 90-minute session was 1:18.455s. That put him 0.183s ahead of Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel, with Mercedes' Valtteri Bottas a couple of hundredths slower in third place.

Drivers spent the first half hour of the session running the soft compound tyres. Lewis Hamilton eventually set the early pace for Mercedes, his 1:18.779s putting him a few tenths ahead of Ricciardo and his Red Bull team mate and Verstappen.

Not taking any part in this first phase were Jolyon Palmer and Kevin Magnussen. Both drivers were waiting for their teams to complete repairs following red flag incidents in morning practice. Palmer eventually made an appearance before the half hour mark, but Magnussen only came out in the final ten minutes. He was able to complete 11 laps by the end of the session.

Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen was the first driver of the afternoon to switch to supersoft tyres. However, the Ferrari subsequently lost power in turn 13, forcing Raikkonen to reboot the onboard systems to get back underway and return to the pits.

As with the morning session, a number of drivers had brief excursions off the track. Continuing his struggles in the Haas, Romain Grosjean went off at turn 4 early in the session. Meanwhile Williams' Felipe Massa had two spins in quick succession, the first while exiting turn 5 and the second running through the chicane.

The first red flag of the afternoon came after 50 minutes, when Pascal Wehrlein's Sauber stepped out entering turn 11. The front right hit the tyre barrier, spinning the car into a secondary left hand side impact. The incident was quickly cleared up and Wehrlein dispatched to the medical centre for a check over.

The second red flag followed ten minutes later, when Palmer lost the back of the R.S.17 going into the final corner. He caught the initial snap but the car spun the other way and went into the tyre barrier backwards, heavily damaging the right-rear of the just-repaired car.

The interruptions meant that teams had to make do as best they could with long distance runs for the remainder of the session. It left Ricciardo's pre-red flag run on supersofts as the best of the afternoon ahead of Vettel, Bottas and Raikkonen. Hamilton never got a proper chance to improve on his early run on soft tyres and was fifth fastest ahead of Verstappen and Nico Hülkenberg.

Hungarian Grand Prix - Free Practice 2 results

Pos Driver Team Time Gap Laps
1 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull 1:18.455s 32
2 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1:18.638s + 0.183s 28
3 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 1:18.656s + 0.201s 33
4 Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 1:18.755s + 0.300s 28
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:18.779s + 0.324s 31
6 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:18.951s + 0.496s 25
7 Nico Hülkenberg Renault 1:19.714s + 1.259s 33
8 Fernando Alonso McLaren 1:19.815s + 1.360s 31
9 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso 1:19.834s + 1.379s 35
10 Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren 1:19.909s + 1.454s 18
11 Esteban Ocon Force India 1:20.126s + 1.671s 34
12 Sergio Pérez Force India 1:20.266s + 1.811s 33
13 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:20.577s + 2.122s 37
14 Lance Stroll Williams 1:20.791s + 2.336s 31
15 Felipe Massa Williams 1:20.869s + 2.414s 22
16 Jolyon Palmer Renault 1:21.175s + 2.720s 12
17 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:21.345s + 2.890s 11
18 Romain Grosjean Haas 1:21.504s + 3.049s 25
19 Marcus Ericsson Sauber 1:21.559s + 3.104s 31
20 Pascal Wehrlein Sauber 1:21.722s + 3.267s 16

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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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