F1 Fanatic

Mark Webber, Red Bull, Interlagos, 2010

There’s hardly anything to choose between the two Red Bull drivers in their battle for supremacy in Brazil.

Sebastian Vettel may have topped both sessions but Mark Webber’s faster sector times put him ahead by just nine thousandths of a second around a 4.3km lap of Interlagos.

Closest rivals Ferrari showed their hand in the second session but were over three tenths of a second slower than the RB6s.

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Tick/untick drivers’ names to show their laps, click and drag to zoom

The two Red Bull drivers were fastest in first and second practice on Friday at Interlagos.

But although Sebastian Vettel headed both timed sessions, Mark Webber has got the pace to challenge for pole position.

At Korea Vettel took pole position by less than a tenth of a second. Today just 0.009s separated their best ‘ultimate laps’ of the Interlagos track (see below).

Ferrari showed their hand in second practice. Interestingly, Felipe Massa was faster than Fernando Alonso up until his clutch problem halfway through the session.

But McLaren looked out of sorts, Jenson Button complaining about poor rear grip and ending the session 1.2s slower than Vettel. Lewis Hamilton fared slightly better but was still well off the pace.

These three cars look more closely matched on race pace. The front runners’ lap times much more closely matched at the end of the session when they were running higher fuel loads (zoom in to the last 12 minutes’ of the session on the chart above to see).

The super-soft tyre appears to give its best on its first lap – few drivers found an improvement on a later lap. An exception was Alonso, but that could be related to the timing of the yellow flags following Massa’s stoppage.

However with rain expected to fall ahead of final practice and qualifying tomorrow, the grid for Sunday’s race may yet become even harder to predict.

As ever, it’s hard to guess exactly what fuel levels the teams will have been using in this session and a true picture won’t emerge until qualifying.

One driver who was particularly happy with his performance is Nick Heidfeld:

I am quite satisfied because I didn’t expect us to be that strong here, and the lap time isn’t on the edge yet. The long runs were even better than eighth fastest. I feel here I made a step forward with the set up of the car.
Nick Heidfeld

Ultimate laps

An ultimate lap is a drivers’ best three times in each sector added together.

2010 Brazilian Grand Prix

• 2010 Brazilian Grand Prix: the complete F1 Fanatic race weekend review
• Vote for the best driver of the Brazilian GP weekend
• Red Bull win teams title but risk throwing drivers championship away
• Alonso loses the battle but he’s winning the war
• Poor pace spells end of McLaren’s title hopes
• Hülkenberg eighth after pole position
• Mercedes seal fourth in constructors’ championship
• Brazil sees most race finishers since 1952
• Force India fall behind Williams in teams’ title
• Kubica frustrated by Hülkenberg’s defence

Image © Red Bull/Getty images