Lewis Hamilton turns up the wick to set Spa pace
Flying Hamilton pulls six-tenths clear of Rosberg; World Champ Vettel
misses P2 after engine problem; Maldonado crashes on first timed lap.
Lewis Hamilton laid down the gauntlet for his latest likely battle
for victory with Nico Rosberg at this weekend's Belgian GP by setting a
dominant pace in Practice Two at Spa. For the sixth P2 session in
succession, it was the chaser in the all-Mercedes title duel who ended
the opening day of a race weekend with the fastest time as the two
Silver Arrows once more held sway around the long, sweeping Spa lap.
Hamilton, fresh from a post-P1 pitlane soaking after taking on the
ice-bucket challenge, was on red-hot form during the afternoon session's
qualifying simulations and his lap of 1:49.189 was over half a second
quicker than Rosberg's.
"The car felt pretty good. It's good to be back, I'm sure I'm going
to feel something tonight or tomorrow," Hamilton told Sky Sports F1.
"But it's definitely good to get back into the car, it didn't feel so
good in the morning but it was better in the afternoon.
We still have some work to do." Although Rosberg, the 11-point
championship leader, did lose some time by running slightly wide at the
top of the hill on his best lap, Hamilton's overall lap and general pace
through the session was clearly superior to the point where only one
non-W05 runner was able to get within one second of him.
That man - impressively so - was Fernando Alonso who lapped just a
second adrift of Rosberg in his Ferrari despite the top positions on the
timesheet predictably being dominated by Mercedes-powered cars on one of
F1's fastest tracks.
After a quiet morning, much-fancied Williams began to show their hand
with Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas sandwiching McLaren's Jenson
Button in fourth and sixth places respectively.Spa's famous layout, and
the 7km circuit's first and final sectors in particular, had been
expected to present a challenge for World Champions and Hungarian GP
victors Red Bull, but even so their Friday afternoon was particularly
troubled as Sebastian Vettel missed the entire session and Daniel
Ricciardo finished only eighth, 1.7 seconds off the pace.
Vettel's latest bout of 2014 misfortune was triggered by an
electrical issue in P1 which caused wider damage to his RB10's Renault
engine. With a change of unit required, Red Bull's mechanics were never
going to complete the work in time to get the German out for the
afternoon. Furthermore, the change of unit is set to push Vettel
precariously close to his penalty-free engine limit for the season.Still,
spare a thought for Pastor Maldonado's sustained plight. After being
involved in numerous incidents up to the summer break, the Venezuelan,
still scoreless for Lotus, crashed out on his first time lap in P2 after
running wide on the entry to Pouhon.
The force of the impact into the barriers - the E22's front
suspension was ripped off in the crash - meant Maldonado was taken to
the circuit's medical centre for precautionary checks but the driver was
given the all-clear.In sharp contrast to Vettel and Maldonado's woes, a
more uplifting story continued to develop at Caterham where their
32-year-old F1 debutant Andre Lotterer completed an impressive race
weekend bow by lapping within half a tenth of the team's regular race
driver Marcus Ericsson.
Having not driven an F1 car for 12 years let alone his new team's
current CT05 the German sportscar driver made no significant errors of
note to finish close behind both Ericsson and Max Chilton, who returned
to his Marussia after his swift reinstatement to his race seat.
23 Aug SKY Sports
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