Button fastest in rain-affected second practice

2012 Monaco Grand Prix second practice

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An early effort on super-soft tyres by Jenson Button gave him the fastest time in the second session at Monaco.

Rain shortly after his first run meant few drivers were able to improve during the rest of the day’s running.

The second hour-and-a-half of practice got off to a very busy start as the teams anticipated rainfall early in the session.

With the weather radars showing rain heading towards the track, all 24 cars were on the track quickly including Heikki Kovalainen’s repaired Caterham and Kimi Raikkonen’s Lotus.

Some teams found time to switch to the super-soft tyres to get a lap in. That allowed Jenson Button to set the fastest time early on, lapping in 1’15.746.

After the rain came the cars made for the pits and the track fell silent.

Within a few minutes the rain had stopped and the track dried. That encourage several teams to return to the circuit in search of dry running. But just as they’d reached the point of trying the super-soft tyres the rain returned, sending them back to their garages.

By the final half-hour the track was sufficiently wet for some drivers to try running on intermediate tyres. The tricky conditions caught several of them out but they kept their cars out of the barriers.

Both Williams drivers went off at Mirabeau – Bruno Senna reversing onto the track, Pastor Maldonado having to be pushed there by the marshals.

They started a fashion for going off at the corner. Sergio Perez was also recovered by the corner workers when he went off there, then Felipe Massa and Heikki Kovalainen did likewise later on. Kovalainen was the only one who could not return to the track, so for the second session in a row his practice came to an early end.

Pos.No.DriverCarBest lapGapLaps
13Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Mercedes1’15.74617
210Romain GrosjeanLotus-Renault1’16.1380.39219
36Felipe MassaFerrari1’16.6020.85621
45Fernando AlonsoFerrari1’16.6610.91523
518Pastor MaldonadoWilliams-Renault1’16.8201.07420
68Nico RosbergMercedes1’17.0211.27515
72Mark WebberRed Bull-Renault1’17.1481.40223
814Kamui KobayashiSauber-Ferrari1’17.1531.40722
97Michael SchumacherMercedes1’17.2931.54711
101Sebastian VettelRed Bull-Renault1’17.3031.55721
114Lewis HamiltonMcLaren-Mercedes1’17.3751.62919
1211Paul di RestaForce India-Mercedes1’17.3951.64921
1319Bruno SennaWilliams-Renault1’17.6551.90918
1412Nico HulkenbergForce India-Mercedes1’17.8002.05425
1515Sergio PerezSauber-Ferrari1’18.2512.50524
1621Vitaly PetrovCaterham-Renault1’18.4402.69425
1717Jean-Eric VergneToro Rosso-Ferrari1’18.5222.77622
1816Daniel RicciardoToro Rosso-Ferrari1’18.8083.06226
199Kimi RaikkonenLotus-Renault1’19.2673.52125
2024Timo GlockMarussia-Cosworth1’19.3093.56329
2120Heikki KovalainenCaterham-Renault1’20.0294.28313
2225Charles PicMarussia-Cosworth1’20.2404.49421
2322Pedro de la RosaHRT-Cosworth1’20.6314.88512
2423Narain KarthikeyanHRT-Cosworth1’20.8865.14010

2012 Monaco Grand Prix

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Image © McLaren/Hoch Zwei

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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 “Button fastest in rain-affected second practice”

  1. WOW! Massa faster than Alonso

    1. Reminds me of neutrinos: last year neutrinos were claimed to go faster than light, which is against ALL the laws of physics.

      1. Wahaha, damn read this on my iPhone at work, theb had to explain away why I suddenly laughed aloud

      2. @andae23 I knew their results were in dispute but didn’t realise that it had been confirmed they were wrong?

        1. @andrewtanner The press just ran with the story, while the OPERA researchers suspected some kind of measurement error from the get-go. As it turns out there were two issues that affected the reported result. It was a faulty connection of the fiber-optic cable and a faulty GPS.

          @andae23 Actually it wouldn’t be against ALL the laws of physics. Some variants of quantum gravity might allow faster-than-light neutrinos (Lorentz violating models). Neutrinos could have tachyonic nature and could travel faster than light.

    2. That alone should tell you that this session was aberrational.

      Massa faster than Alonso.
      Massa in the top three.

      Massa back on form? No, Mother Nature at its most capricious.

      1. Massa was faster than Alonso multiple times last year as well. It shouldn’t be a surprise.

        What’s more surprising, however, is that Massa was either the fastest or 2nd fastest on the softs. And yes, I know it started to rain early.

      2. Hmmm, no possible chance he’s a talented driver struggling with the car’s grip in dry conditions, and the rain leveled the playing field? It’s similar to Rossi in the last Moto GP race.

    3. Nah I don’t really think we should be excited. Wait for saturday. If he does qualify in the top 5 then I will be shocked. And since the only thing Massa still does outstandingly is the start, I’d pay a lot of attention to him. But, I insist, this means nothing.

      1. Nah I don’t really think we should be excited. Wait for saturday.

        Exactly. Felipe has been fairly quick or at least quicker than Alonso in FP sessions on a number of occasions so far, but quali & races…a whole other story.

        However, the whole “ultimatum” thing might have been a good idea. Q3 will tell. :)

  2. Who knows who’s gonna be up there on saturday? So difficult to read this…!

  3. Getting harder to read…I just wish the weekend remains dry sessions.

  4. Button and Kobayashi only ones who set times on super softs Kobayashi did not get clear lap

    1. What about Massa, Alonso & Grosjean? Were their times set on the softs?

      1. They did their fastest lap on the primes, which means Grosjeans lap was quite impressive

    2. ruth517 (@spanishconnection)
      24th May 2012, 14:59

      Did I see a smiling JB, not complaining about anything?

      1. Yeah. I’m pretty sure I saw a MASSIVE smile on his face afterwards :P

      2. He had a big smile on his face after FP3 in Barcelona as well. I’m pretty sure it will get wiped off his face when Lewis, Fernando, Seb, Kimi & gang start showing their pace.

        1. I don’t know what he would be smiling about. He is only 3 tenths faster than the Lotus which was on a slower tyre. Grosjean will take pole this weekend and then deliver a sixth winning driver for the start of the season, although Kimi will have something to say about it if he does not allow his lack of running to affect his perfomance.

  5. That Lotus, at least in Grosjean hands, looks mighty fast.

  6. fast times by grosjean all day, he could be a surprise for pole.

    1. In a sense, though… He’s not much of a surprise.
      He’s been showing incredible promise all year; only marred by his first two races.

      True, though. He is definitely one to watch for pole this week!

      1. He’s 13.5 on Betfair for pole (25/2 in old money I think)

        1. you mean 27/2?

  7. Would it be possible to have an additional column showing what tyre the fastest lap time was set on (like the official timing)? This would be particularly useful when looking at practice times and comparing team mates.

    Nice one Petrov by the way. Come on Caterham, get some points!

    1. Here is a bit more tyre info for FP2:

      Drivers who set fastest Practice 2 time on Super Soft tyres:

      – Jenson Button (P1)
      – Pastor Maldonado (P5)
      – Mark Webber (P7)
      – Kamui Kobayashi (P8)
      – Lewis Hamilton (P11)
      – Paul di Resta (P12)
      – Sergio Pérez (P15)
      – Vitaly Petrov (P16)
      – Jean-Éric Vergne (P17)

      from:
      http://www.gpupdate.net/en/f1-news/279037/drivers-striving-for-more-tyre-information/

      1. The named drivers used these tyres but only Button and Kobayashi set their fastest times as the others were caught out by the rain and traffic

      2. Are you sure? They went out but was the fastest time on S. Soft. Di Resta was.

        1. The TV screens shows on which the times were set and they are these two are shown as super soft and the others not

    2. Ferrari have arrived at the summit clearly, and look like the second fastest car on the grid behind Lotus with MacLaren third. The only way Grosjean is going to be beaten this weekend is by the experience of Kimi and Alonso, and also he must avoid making the same errors at the start that saw him drop down the grid at the start of the season.

      1. Agreed, on some level. Regarding Grosjean and Alonso, I mean.

        However I don’t see Kimi fighting for the win this weekend as I don’t think Hamilton should be taken out of the equation. He’s been awfully quiet so far which gets me thinking he’s got something up his sleeve.

        Could see the Saubers delivering something as well. If they manage to squeeze their drivers into Q3 and play the extreme-tire-conservative-strategies hand, we could be in for a massive surprise. Remember Koba – 5th from 12th on the grid in 2011. That was no mistake.

        Same goes for Maldonado if he doesn’t pluck it into the barriers by any chance.

        I could rule out the Red Bulls (unless it rains) and Mercedes though…

  8. I don’t think we can read too much into FP1 either. I imagine peoples usual plans would have been shelved if they were expecting rain in the PM.

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