Sutil fastest in rain as Hamilton crashes
Adrian Sutil set the fastest time in a rain-hit first practice session at the Hockenheimring.
But McLaren’s hopes of gaining more useful information about their exhaust-blown diffuser were dashed when Lewis Hamilton crashed having done just eight laps.
Hamilton lost his McLaren at the exit of turn three, bounced across the grass and went into the barrier nose-first. The car rotated and hit the barrier at the left-rear corner causing significant damage.
Practice started on a very wet track which dried throughout the session.
Felipe Massa set the second fastest time after a series of spins on the drying track.
But the only other driver to join Hamilton in spinning out of the session was Bruno Senna, who got his HRT stuck in the gravel trap at the final corner in the final quarter of an hour.
Jenson Button improved to third at the end of an otherwise quiet session for McLaren.
Further rain is expected ahead of second practice in Germany.
| Pos. | Car | Driver | Car | Best lap | Gap | Laps |
| 1 | 14 | Adrian Sutil | Force India-Mercedes | 1’25.701 | 20 | |
| 2 | 7 | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | 1’26.850 | 1.149 | 27 |
| 3 | 1 | Jenson Button | McLaren-Mercedes | 1’26.936 | 1.235 | 16 |
| 4 | 9 | Rubens Barrichello | Williams-Cosworth | 1’26.947 | 1.246 | 21 |
| 5 | 12 | Vitaly Petrov | Renault | 1’26.948 | 1.247 | 21 |
| 6 | 4 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1’27.448 | 1.747 | 20 |
| 7 | 16 | Sebastien Buemi | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’28.114 | 2.413 | 31 |
| 8 | 10 | Nico Hülkenberg | Williams-Cosworth | 1’28.193 | 2.492 | 24 |
| 9 | 15 | Vitantonio Liuzzi | Force India-Mercedes | 1’28.300 | 2.599 | 19 |
| 10 | 22 | Pedro de la Rosa | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’28.486 | 2.785 | 23 |
| 11 | 5 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull-Renault | 1’28.735 | 3.034 | 21 |
| 12 | 24 | Timo Glock | Virgin-Cosworth | 1’28.735 | 3.034 | 21 |
| 13 | 11 | Robert Kubica | Renault | 1’28.903 | 3.202 | 20 |
| 14 | 6 | Mark Webber | Red Bull-Renault | 1’29.048 | 3.347 | 13 |
| 15 | 18 | Jarno Trulli | Lotus-Cosworth | 1’29.280 | 3.579 | 17 |
| 16 | 17 | Jaime Alguersuari | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’29.366 | 3.665 | 34 |
| 17 | 2 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren-Mercedes | 1’29.429 | 3.728 | 8 |
| 18 | 25 | Lucas di Grassi | Virgin-Cosworth | 1’29.500 | 3.799 | 19 |
| 19 | 8 | Fernando Alonso | Ferrari | 1’29.684 | 3.983 | 15 |
| 20 | 23 | Kamui Kobayashi | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’29.690 | 3.989 | 17 |
| 21 | 19 | Fairuz Fauzy | Lotus-Cosworth | 1’30.938 | 5.237 | 27 |
| 22 | 21 | Bruno Senna | HRT-Cosworth | 1’31.720 | 6.019 | 23 |
| 23 | 3 | Michael Schumacher | Mercedes | 1’32.450 | 6.749 | 13 |
| 24 | 20 | Sakon Yamamoto | HRT-Cosworth | 1’32.791 | 7.090 | 26 |
2010 German Grand Prix
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- Who was the best driver of the German Grand Prix weekend? (Poll)
Image (C) Force India F1 Team
richard hughes said on 23rd July 2010, 10:44
looks like virgin has found some good form to compete with some of the existing teams and with lotus saying that they have no more major upgrades for the car is this virgins time to take lotus’ crown of the fastest and best new team
ps i support lotus :)
spawinte said on 23rd July 2010, 10:45
I know wet track and all but would ya lookit that virgin in 12th. :)
W154 said on 23rd July 2010, 10:46
KK did 1-29.69 in practice. What is 10 sec penalty for?
Calum said on 23rd July 2010, 10:47
Great to see Force India heading the field, and quite funny to see the two “No 2 Drivers,” Button and Massa shining, the ones who were going to be destroyed by their teammates ;)
Disapoited to see Lewis Hamilton ruin his car after the spin especialy since others were getting away with it, but there was a feeling of ” Not again Lewis!!”
Alex said on 23rd July 2010, 11:23
I’m not a hamilton fan at all, but his quality to push the car to the absolute limit (and sometimes over is) is something I’d like to see more drivers have. You have to agree that crashing a car now and then because you pushed to hard is a lot better than “saving tires” and “saving fuel”.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65) said on 23rd July 2010, 13:43
sometimes you have to calm down and get the result you NEED other than the result you WANT. And that’s something i can’t stand about Lewis.
Alright, he always pushes the car to its limits and always tries to overtake bla bla bla. But sometimes he does it too often with no reason whatsoever.
John H said on 23rd July 2010, 12:25
“..Button and Massa shining..”
Did you watch the session!!??
MacLeod said on 23rd July 2010, 10:48
Sutil is more then a second faster then number 2 what happend here? he drove around when it was dry? Is Lewis alright btw that must be a hard crash.
Steph90 (@steph90) said on 23rd July 2010, 10:58
Lewis said he was ok
KNF said on 23rd July 2010, 11:01
As they said in the commentary, no physical damage, but he’s probably unhappy with his mistake…
Victor. said on 23rd July 2010, 10:48
Petrov remains a mystery…
fordsrule said on 23rd July 2010, 10:55
Senna in front of Schumacher, lets hope it continues for the rest of the weekend :D
HounslowBusGarage (@hounslowbusgarage) said on 23rd July 2010, 10:55
I missed this morning’s session and have just read about Ham’s crash. But what happened to Schu?
Steph90 (@steph90) said on 23rd July 2010, 11:00
Schu at the end of the session when it was quite dry was running around on the full wets. I have no idea why.
Jean said on 23rd July 2010, 12:11
doing some “testing” work – Schu. is a few tenths slower than Rosberg at present , not 5 secs slower
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine) said on 23rd July 2010, 11:01
They had some problems with their rear wing, they sent him out on worn wets at the end for an evaluation run.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine) said on 23rd July 2010, 11:02
Weather-watchers can see the incoming belt of rain on the radar here. Hockenheim is roughly halfway between Stuttgart and Wiesbaden. The rain is coming from the south-west:
http://www.weatheronline.co.uk/cgi-app/radar?CONT=euro&CREG=dwddg&LOOP=1<YP=tag&LANG=en&STRUCTUR=_&W=0&L=0&SLP=0&ROAD=0&CITY=
MacLeod said on 23rd July 2010, 11:16
fp2 is going to be very wet, if i see the chart correctly.
Matt said on 23rd July 2010, 11:03
Shumacher only beat Yamamoto? Wow, keep dreaming of the 2011 title!
Dev said on 23rd July 2010, 11:09
whats happened to that Force India, there are very little upgrades to VJM03. maybe others were taking it a bit easy, times hence would not be representative of true pace.
LewisC said on 23rd July 2010, 11:11
Shame about Hamilton’s crash, but once these cars get away from you the track’s so slippery – as pretty much everyone demonstrated.
It looks to me like they’re all trying to run “dry” low downforce settings because the forecast for Sunday is dry, but on the wet track I’m not sure they can be learning anything…
Splint3r said on 23rd July 2010, 11:25
I’m not jumping to any conclusion about the cars until the end of final practice session. Judging lap speeds based on their experimental setups most of the time gives the wrong impression.
MacLeod said on 23rd July 2010, 11:29
It seems when Sutil made his fast lap the track was ‘dried’ up on the raceline so he used intermeds? They all run low downforce setting for the dry? And what are they going todo for the Qualifer? I think Sutil can keep the most behind him when he is starting as number 1.
But there is more rain expected so lets wait for FP2
statix said on 23rd July 2010, 12:43
You assume that sutil will start from pole after 1st (wet!) FP? :)
MacLeod said on 23rd July 2010, 14:27
No i didn’t say that. only said to say it’s stupid to think other where on dry low downforce setup. We can actually only hope he starts on Pole )
statix said on 23rd July 2010, 23:12
ah, ok :) thanx for explanation :)
martin bell said on 23rd July 2010, 11:47
Gentlemen, start your conspiracy theories!!! Should they take the floor/EBD off JB’s car to replace Lewis’s broken one with?
cesium said on 23rd July 2010, 11:52
mclaren says they have a spare floor…so no “red bull story” here!!
http://mclaren.com/home