Vettel fastest in second practice at Monza

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Sebastian Vettel was fastest in the second practice session at Monza.

He pipped Fernando Alonso by seven hundredths of a second and Felipe Massa underlined Ferrari’s pace with the third fastest time.

Massa had been poised to improve his time before going off at the exit of the Parabolica at speed.

He slid sideways through the gravel trap and narrowly missed hitting the barrier.

The McLaren drivers led the way in the early part of the session despite running substantially different set-ups on their cars.

Jenson Button continued using the steeper rear wing from first practice to begin with, while Lewis Hamilton used a lower rear wing and then tried a version without the F-duct. He was just 0.056s quicker than Button at the end of the session.

Hamilton suffered a problem with his front wing during one run when the front-right endplate broke, forcing him to pit for repairs.

Mark Webber ended the session in sixth place but had to cut his running short after a water leak on his engine. He was told by his team to stop the car on the track.

But that paled in comparison to HRT’s problems. Bruno Senna made three attempts to get out on the track, all of which ended with the car breaking down. Sakon Yamamoto only managed five laps in his car.

A few other drivers joined Massa in off-track excursions. Michael Schumacher went off at the Parabolica earlier in the session, though somewhat less dramatically than Massa, and Kamui Kobayashi slewed sideways into the gravel at the second Lesmo corner.

Pos.CarDriverCarBest lapGap
15Sebastian VettelRed Bull-Renault1’22.839
28Fernando AlonsoFerrari1’22.9150.076
37Felipe MassaFerrari1’23.0610.222
42Lewis HamiltonMcLaren-Mercedes1’23.1540.315
51Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Mercedes1’23.2100.371
66Mark WebberRed Bull-Renault1’23.4150.576
79Rubens BarrichelloWilliams-Cosworth1’23.7080.869
811Robert KubicaRenault1’23.7090.870
910Nico HulkenbergWilliams-Cosworth1’23.8521.013
104Nico RosbergMercedes1’23.8571.018
1114Adrian SutilForce India-Mercedes1’24.1811.342
1215Vitantonio LiuzziForce India-Mercedes1’24.3801.541
1312Vitaly PetrovRenault1’24.4071.568
143Michael SchumacherMercedes1’24.4481.609
1516Sebastien BuemiToro Rosso-Ferrari1’24.5171.678
1622Pedro de la RosaSauber-Ferrari1’24.5471.708
1723Kamui KobayashiSauber-Ferrari1’24.7851.946
1817Jaime AlguersuariToro Rosso-Ferrari1’25.1062.267
1918Jarno TrulliLotus-Cosworth1’26.2043.365
2019Heikki KovalainenLotus-Cosworth1’26.3063.467
2125Lucas di GrassiVirgin-Cosworth1’26.6313.792
2224Timo GlockVirgin-Cosworth1’26.6763.837
2320Sakon YamamotoHRT-Cosworth1’29.4986.659
2421Bruno SennaHRT-Cosworth

2010 Italian Grand Prix

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    Keith Collantine
    Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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    32 comments on “Vettel fastest in second practice at Monza”

    1. I really thought Massa was going to crash and badly too. He’s still a wild boy at times but at least he’s good at saving his own neck! That was the moment of the session for me.

      I feel really sorry for Bruno. What a miserable day. I think his car stopped about 4 times in the end. I hope things are much better for him for the rest of the weekend.

      1. Fully agree with you there Steph. I suppose he did get a bit over exited there with the perspective of having a really good car here in Monza.
        What a relieve he saved it right on time. Let’s hope he takes it to P3 or better tomorrow as well.

        The HRT team really had a lot of trouble today. 3 times stopped for Bruno Senna, not sure how much running YAM got, but it was nott too much i suppose.

      2. That was a great recovery, rallying would be proud.

        1. Massa thought along the same lines Tiomkin…

          Massa: At the end of the second session, I tried to copy Kimi and do a bit of rallying…

          1. Given the way Ferrari is treating Massa, he probably will follow Kimi at the end of this season.

    2. I think quite a lot of this has to do with the Red Bulls and Ferraris doing their fast runs later than McLaren. I think McLaren are confident enough in their speed to not aim for glory today. We’ll have a better idea tomorrow, probably.

      1. I think you’re right. It’s gonna be incredibly close between all three teams tomorrow. I think pole position is anybody’s (from those teams) at this point. Hoping to see Kubica surprise and clinch a good spot on the grid.

    3. So McLaren is faster with the F-Duct. That is very interesting, since the wisdom is that you want only enough downforce to be able to brake in straight line here. They have a hard choice to make, they may lock out the front row running the F-Duct but can they keep from being passed before they can make some gap on the track. Someone needs to box Horner’s ears for his pathetic, fake whining about how bad they where going to do here.

      1. The other benefit of running the fduct is that the tyre degradation may well be far less allowing them to run for longer on the soft tyres. This could give them a big advantage in the race.

        1. Yes, the probably recall last year how Brawn pulled a coup by making their tires last longer.

      2. Wasn’t Lewis the faster one of them, in the car running without the F-duct?

        I think they might be doing seperate strategies for Button and Hamilton tomorrow and in the race.

        1. Wouldn’t be the first time. They definitely have different handling preferences, and have had much different reactions to some of their upgrades this year.

      3. NO McLaren were faster WITHOUT the F-duct but was that just the Hamilton Factor?

        1. That was a reply to DaveW who comments are normally informative and spot on.

        2. I hadn’t realized McLaren had split their set up in FP2. So I had it wrong. I was comparing FP1 to FP2 relative to other teams. So yeah Hamilton was a bit quicker in FP2 running without it than Button with it. (Hamilton has about .25s on Button normally but here I don’t think a driver’s raw pace matters so much on this track). They have an interesting choice to make.

    4. WOrthless these pratices for the prediction game. Who to choose and place them where based off these fp1 and fp2 results!

      If i select Vettel again ad pole something happens and Weber is first or i select Weber And Hamilton is pole. Or must i just guess and hope that RB and Ferarri trash each other.

      I hope to see a patron with the high speed and laptimes and try to compare with each other… Keith i love the topspeeds diag!

    5. If I were the head of something important at the Renault engine factory, I’d want to terminate my engine supply with RedBull. All they ever do is complain about the engine and make negative comments about it. The only reason the media and fans all have a predisposed idea that Renault engines are slow is because of RedBulls rantings. Why isn’t Toro Rosso Sweeping up the track with a similar package and a Ferrari engine? (especially last year when the cars were identical)

      1. Sound_Of_Madness
        10th September 2010, 15:25

        Not meant to defend RBR, but last year there was a huge quality difference between the RBR and the STR drivers.

        1. Agreed. Didn’t really consider that but you would think that if the car was the same with a ‘better’ engine and weaker drivers, that at least TR would have been closer. no?

        2. In 2008 when a better driver was in the STR, they won a race… before RBR had ever won a race. Not sure if the cars were identical that year other than engines though. I would assume they were pretty similar.

          It does seem that the Renault is probably a bit down on power compared to other engines though. RBR and Renault have both been extremely dominant on slower twistier tracks, but less so on the high speed circuits. Vettel’s time today may be an indicator that’s changed though. We’ll see tomorrow I guess.

      2. Very good point. Its understandable why they do though, since its the only non-standard non-red Bull part in the car.

      3. Agree with you completely. I’m not sure why anyone would want to give RBR an engine if they continue to slag it off. Is that really what Renault or any other engine manufacturers need?

        Make your own engines Red Bull, or be quiet.

    6. Have Red Bull found a solution ? Only time will tell.

      1. It’s not so much a solution, it’s just that the combination of the good slow-corner stability of the RB6 and the ‘driveability’ of the Renault engine means that both Red Bull drivers get excellent clean exits from corners. They don’t have the top speed of the McLarens or Ferraris, but they can hit it quicker.

        1. actually they were going faster than them at the speed traps!

          1. The high Torque of the Renault engine is helping them a lot to achieve good lap time.

    7. Do we get the ultimate lap times for this practice session?

    8. vettel would be tomorow 1

    9. Mclaren have pretty much admitted that they have more pace in the post FP interviews, but how much? They are also a bit surprised by the pace RBR and Ferrari found late on (but I really don’t know why) it seems to me just like Spa they have it in hand again. They are the ones to beat.

    10. McLaren will surely get rid of the F-duct otherwise they will a tasty slipstreaming snack for the Red Bulls and Ferraris.

      Expect Jenson to run without said ‘duct’ tomorrow morning.

    11. oh..i missed massa^s incident….iam eager to watch..any video available????? help me guys.iam tired of searching

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