UpdateF1 >> Formula 1 News > Mclaren bounce back

Silver leads red at Spa

A distinct sense of déjà vu prevailed after the second practice session here at Spa Francorchamps as, just as at Monza last week, Ferrari found their previous dominance eclipsed by a resurgent Mclaren team in the second of the two 90 minutes sessions.

Form-man Fernando Alonso – few would disagree, surely – set an early benchmark that was over a second quicker than the next best of the time, a 1:46.654 that looked in danger only briefly as Lewis Hamilton put in a late run. The young pretender to the throne missed out by just one tenth of a second, and in doing so shunted Felipe Massa back to third position.

Massa seemed unperturbed by his lack of running this morning, enforced after an early off, and duly took the third best time, his time a shade under the 1:47 mark and a couple of tenths up on team mate Kimi Raikkonen. Analysis of the sector times shows that Ferrari pair are as quick – maybe quicker – than the Mclarens, but are losing out to some degree in the all important 47 second mid sector of this mighty circuit.

Fifth and sixth – and this something of a surprise – went to Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher in the Toyota TF107, a fact no doubt helped by the impressive straight line speed achieved by the two, who figured in the top six all session. With the gap between the Italian and the German almost half a second, only Trulli edged into the within a second of Alonso bracket, and even that a clear three tenths slower than Raikkonen.

From here on the field becomes even more spread out, with Giancarlo Fisichella the quickest Renault in seventh, albeit a couple of tenths down on Schumacher, and Mark Webber a similar distance behind the Renault in his Red Bull.

Robert Kubica emerged quicker of the two somewhat lacklustre BMW drivers, a hairs breadth behind Webber, and Heikki Kovalainen made it two R27’s in the top ten with a time just under two seconds slower than Alonso.

Nick Heidfeld just shaded Kovalainen, with Nico Rosberg a disappointing twelfth, the first man outside two seconds of the pace in the Williams.

David Coulthard deserved better, the Scot having run on Webbers pace all session until being brought to a halt out on the circuit, and the two Honda runners line up in a dismal 14th and 15th.

Behind them comes Alex Wurz, and behind Wurz’s Williams one of the true surprises of this meeting, for here we have Sakon Yamamoto in the Spyker.

That the Japanese could produce a time three tenths off the Williams, was looking at the Hondas, and eclipsed both Toro Rosso and Super Aguri entries, is testament to the improvement this little team have made to their chassis. Even more remarkable is that Adrian Sutil, until forced to end his session early with half an hour to go, was consistently six tenths quicker than Yamamoto, and lapping in the same times as the Honda pair, and often quicker..

Toro Rosso and Super Aguri had nothing to offer here, although Sebastian Vettel did well to head the quartet by a good half a second.
An interesting battle is in prospect between Mclaren and Ferrari, and add the unpredictable weather into that and we may have a very exciting qualifying session tomorrow.

Written: Fri, 14 Sep 2007 14:03:06