Spanish Grand Prix - Friday practice thread

[Dixie Flatline]

Friday practice is about to get underway...

... Doornbos is the first to take to the track.

[Dixie Flatline]

Scratch that, Klien, de la Rosa, Zonta, JV, Massa, and Doornbos are out on the track.

[Super Tourer]

A reminder- here is the link to Live Timing.

http://www.formula1.com/race/livetiming/736.html

[Dixie Flatline]

Zonta finally sets a lap - 1:18.794. Klien is 3.4 seconds slower - 1:22.276.

[Dixie Flatline]

Slower than a wet week - only 4 drivers have recorded times: Zonta - 1:18.103, de la Rosa: 1:18.941, Klien: 1:19.184, Doornbos: 1:21.664.

No BAR drivers here today.

[flor]

BMW will have to switch both drivers engines, Weber will not drive today -> he wont get a penalty. Heidfelds engine is damaged but he will drive today.

[mabs_nsx]

F1-bar=boring

[mabs_nsx]

I always enjoy watching F1. I never knew that F1 could posibly be boring. But with no BAR it is


I am going to slep it is so boring

[Adam43]

Night.

*wonders what I am missing* *also wonders if I should watch '86 season review tonight*

[Dixie Flatline]

Originally Posted by flor

BMW will have to switch both drivers engines, Weber will not drive today -> he wont get a penalty. Heidfelds engine is damaged but he will drive today.

Quick Nick's engine can't be too bad as he's second fastest at the moment with a 1:17.642, which is 0.068 seconds slower than TGF's time. But you're right - no appearance yet by Webber.

[TheMong]

here we go shumi top of the list with a 117:574

[Dixie Flatline]

G'day mate - interesting, um, username you have there!

[Super Tourer]

Originally Posted by flor

BMW will have to switch both drivers engines, Weber will not drive today -> he wont get a penalty. Heidfelds engine is damaged but he will drive today.

BMW have discovered an exhaust valve defect in the engines, new spec engines are being built up in Munich and will be shipped to Barcelona for Saturday practice.

Nick will lose 10 grid slots from his qualifying position. Not much going right for BMW Williams at the moment.

[Super Tourer]

By way of comparison, the fastest time in 1st practice in 2004 was 1:15.658 set by Michael Schumacher.

De la Rosa is pretty much matching that currently.

[Adam43]

That is a shame, I was hoping to see both in with a shout. It isn't all over though.

[blaarg]

Albers is showing as stopped in the first sector.

[blaarg]

It also appears the gap between the minardi's and jordans has diminished.

Albers holds the top speed in sector 4 of 323km/h.

The new cossie surely doesn't lack in the HP department!

[Dixie Flatline]

P. de la Rosa        1:15.675
C. Klien             1:16.821    1.146
N. Heidfeld          1:17.047    1.372
M. Schumacher        1:17.574    1.899
K. Raikkonen         1:17.851    2.176
D. Coulthard         1:17.977    2.302
R. Zonta             1:18.103    2.428
V. Liuzzi            1:18.112    2.437
R. Schumacher        1:18.204    2.529
J. Montoya           1:18.402    2.727
F. Massa             1:19.328    3.653
J. Villeneuve        1:20.621    4.946
T. Monteiro          1:20.773    5.098
R. Doornbos          1:20.912    5.237
N. Karthikeyan       1:21.628    5.953
C. Albers            1:21.635    5.960
P. Friesacher        1:22.454    6.779
R. Barrichello       no time
G. Fisichella        no time
F. Alonso            no time
J. Trulli            no time
M. Webber            no time

[BootsOntheSide]

Bad luck for Nick, relatively good luck for Webber in that they discovered the problem before using the engine, meaning that the only misses out on track time rather than grid position. Teams like Sauber and RBR will see this race as a great chance for points.

[Glen]

Very tough track for set-up - so it is bad news for Webber.

[Dixie Flatline]

But the teams do test at Barcelona quite a bit, don't they? If Williams has tested there recently, shouldn't that help Webber a bit?

[ActiveMS]

Originally Posted by Dixie Flatline

But the teams do test at Barcelona quite a bit, don't they? If Williams has tested there recently, shouldn't that help Webber a bit?

Agreed, they should all know the track backwards, so setup should not be affected that much. If thats the excuse after the race I would not be impressed.

[Glen]

From that PlanetF1 story - and backing up what I was saying about other teams:
__

"Fry revealed BAR are not the only team to have used the controversial fuel system and predicted some of their rivals may be forced into hasty changes.

He added: "We know that the other teams have got a similar system. The fuel tank supplier who supplies us is the same as many of the teams and they have confirmed there's nothing unusual about or system."

"There have been rumours other people have been looking at their cars overall."
__

[Dixie Flatline]

Second practice session now underway and we already have nine drivers who have completed at least one flying lap - Zonta is the fastest so far with 1:16.885, followed by de la Rosa, Massa, Liuzzi, Klien, Villeneuve, Monteiro, Doornbos, Coulthard, and Friesacher,

[N I Tram]

If anyone is significantly slower that we expected, the chances are that they have been outside the rules until now.

Actually, if you're going to lose Friday anywhere, you'd want it to be Barcelona, as none of the teams really ahve anything mroe to learn about the track and how their cars perform there. Webber seems to have strokes of luck like this quite frequently. Maybe this is his chance to finally beat Nick in a race. Considering the pattern so far, I doubt Mark will complain about losing Friday, but his fans will rant and rave about how big a disadvantage they (wrongly) think it is.