Japanese GP: Piastri quickest as showers thwart Suzuka FP2

Wet weather meant that second practice for the 2024 Japanese Grand Prix was largely a wash-out, with 13 cars completing a meagre total of 60 laps during the hour, and just three completing representative laps on slick tyres right before the end.

McLaren calculated the best time to send Oscar Piastri out, and he finished fastest with a time of 1:34.725s which was half a second clear of Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton, with Charles Leclerc four seconds slower in the Ferrari.

At least the sodden home fans in the grandstands were able to cheer Yuki Tsunoda topping the timesheets for an extended period, his time of 1:40.946s proving best of those on the inters and a second clear of RB team mate Daniel Ricciardo.

• 2024 Japanese Grand Prix - Free Practice 2 results

After their misfire (and brake fire) in Australia, Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez had been appropriately bullish when asked about their prospects for Japan. And sure enough, it seemed that they were back to business as normal: in first practice the pair swept the top two spots on the timesheets ahead of Melbourne winner Carlos Sainz in the Ferrari.

In the interval since FP1, the Williams engineers had been busy working on Logan Sargeant's car after the American crashed heavily at Dunlop. However the task had been too much to complete in time, and before the start of of the second session it was confirmed that he would not be taking any further part for the rest of the day.

Another development that had taken place during the intermission was a change in the weather: light rain had begun falling over Suzuka International Racing Course before the lights went green at the end of pit lane to get Friday afternoon's party started. The conditions meant there was little for the teams to gain by heading out, and few wanted to take the risk or sacrifice intermediate tyres in trying. As a result there were no early takers waiting to get out onto the track.

The rain eventually abated, and 12 minutes into the one-hour session there was finally stirring on pit lane with Lewis Hamilton venturing forth to test out the conditions on the medium compound. "It's pretty dry - a couple of small spots, kerbs and that lot wet," he reported to the Mercedes pit wall. But the situation was nonetheless enough to force him to abort his flying lap and return to the garage.

Also briefly sticking a toe out of the door to check the water was RB's Daniel Ricciardo, who had missed FP1 to allow reserve prospect Ayumu Iwasa to get time in the cockpit. However he reported that the rain was picking up again, confirming the rain radar's warning that a big shower was incoming. He too headed home to await developments, leaving the track silent and empty once more.

Eventually McLaren fired up Oscar Piastri's car and ushered the Australian out on track shortly before the halfway point of the session. He was on the intermediate tyres, and unlike Hamilton's excursion it was evident from the spray being thrown up into the air that the track was now much wetter and there was no point setting a time.

Sauber's Zhou Guanyu was next to head out to collect data on how the this year's inters were behaving, soon followed by bis team mate Valtteri Bottas and also local hero Yuki Tsunoda in the RB. Zhou confirmed that the track was not wet enough for a sustained push on the inters, but was still much too wet for slicks but we did at least have the first time of the session with Tsunoda completing a lap of 1:42.304s comparing to Verstappen's FP1 best of 1:30.056s.

A second run saw Tsunoda trim his time to 1:40.946s. Ricciardo was also back out, but he was much slower than his team mate. They were briefly joined by Williams' Alex Albon, but he was very wary indeed with the team desperate to avoid any more costly accidents and repairs given a critical lack of spare parts on hand, and still no spare chassis available if anything serious were to go wrong.

The RBs soon tired of working on a dry line for others to use, and returned to pit lane. Eventually Bottas took up the vacant role of track-drier-in-chief with 20 minutes remaining, the fluorescent green livery of the Sauber neatly accessorised by the band of colour on the sidewalls of the intermediate tyres. However the Finn made no progress, and soon returned to the pits leaving Zhou to pick up the baton.

With ten minutes to go, just seven cars had dared come out to play and only the two RB drivers actually setting a time. But the rain had now stopped, the track was finally drying up, and it encouraged the two Haas of Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen to take sets of soft compound tyres out for a spin. Even as Zhou came back in declaring the conditions too dry for inters, so Magnussen told his race engineers that it was still too wet for slicks.

Albon was back out reported that it was time to try slicks on the Williams. McLaren concurred and ushered Piastri into action on the soft tyres, and he survived to set a new top time of 1:34.725s. Hamilton was out on the same compound accompanied by a backing band of Saubers, and he went second fastest albeit half a second slower than Piastri. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc made a half-hearted late appearance on the softs to go third fastest. There were also times for Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz, but these were little more than sighting laps for tomorrow and well off the pace.

As a result of so little track action, teams will be placing extra emphasis on final practice on Saturday morning before qualifying. But more showers and rain are forecast for the weekend, including a 50-50 prediction of a wet race on Sunday, meaning today's damp squib could be a sign of things to come for the rest of the Suzuka event.

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