Mercedes were well clear of their rivals in therms of one-lap pace at Sepang, but the race simulation runs raised prospects of a much closer contest.
All the front-runners favoured the soft tyre for their longest runs during the second practice session. Max Verstappen and Sebastian Vettel’s lap times compared particularly well with those by the silver cars.
Although the Mercedes drivers were generally a few tenths quicker towards the end of the stint, Vettel’s tyres were slightly older. In terms of overall tyre age, Vettel was able to lap within a tenth of a second of Nico Rosberg in the sub-1’41s bracket on his 16th lap. Hamilton’s pace was a close match for that as well.
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“I think we had a decent day,” Vettel reflected. “We were testing quite a few things, and our pace didn’t look too bad, at least from what I was told inside the car.”
“Mercedes looked again very strong today on long and short runs: as for ourselves, we are pretty happy with the short runs, but I haven’t seen much yet of what the other people did for their long runs.”
Verstappen’s long-run stint for Red Bull was potentially even quicker, though he didn’t run his soft tyres quite as long as the Mercedes drivers did. However it was his medium-tyre stint which really caught the eye as it included four sub-1’40s laps. Rosberg’s quickest time on the same tyre at the end of the session was a 1’40.083 (Hamilton used the hards).
“Our short runs need to get a bit better but the long runs are looking strong,” said Verstappen. “The pace on the soft tyre felt decent, I feel like that tyre has potential on a long run and it allowed me to throw the car into the corners like I wanted to.”
“It’s hard to tell where other drivers are on the first day but Sebastian (Vettel) looks strong, so we need to improve our short run in order to be competitive.”
With qualifying due to start three hours later than today’s second practice session did, we could see greater swings in form than usual. But it’s unlikely Ferrari or Red Bull will find the six-tenths-to-one-second they are missing over a single lap compared to Mercedes.
Their best chance to get ahead of the Mercedes drivers will come at the start. We’ve seen the silver cars struggle to get away well on several occasions, most recently Italy (Hamilton) and Germany (Rosberg). If they can get ahead, today’s evidence suggests they have the pace to stay there.
Longest stint comparison – second practice
This chart shows all the drivers’ lap times (in seconds) during their longest unbroken stint. Very slow laps omitted. Scroll to zoom, drag to pan, right-click to reset:
Complete practice times
Pos | Driver | Car | FP1 | FP2 | Total laps |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 1’35.721 | 1’34.944 | 60 |
2 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1’35.227 | 1’35.177 | 61 |
3 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | 1’36.331 | 1’35.605 | 55 |
4 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | 1’36.315 | 1’35.842 | 47 |
5 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull-TAG Heuer | 1’36.973 | 1’36.037 | 55 |
6 | Sergio Perez | Force India-Mercedes | 1’37.601 | 1’36.284 | 60 |
7 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren-Honda | 1’36.510 | 1’36.296 | 45 |
8 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull-TAG Heuer | 1’36.753 | 1’36.337 | 57 |
9 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India-Mercedes | 1’37.513 | 1’36.390 | 63 |
10 | Jenson Button | McLaren-Honda | 1’37.613 | 1’36.715 | 42 |
11 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’38.055 | 1’36.836 | 55 |
12 | Jolyon Palmer | Renault | 1’39.148 | 1’36.940 | 59 |
13 | Valtteri Bottas | Williams-Mercedes | 1’37.861 | 1’37.016 | 54 |
14 | Esteban Gutierrez | Haas-Ferrari | 1’37.921 | 1’37.048 | 48 |
15 | Felipe Massa | Williams-Mercedes | 1’38.339 | 1’37.110 | 43 |
16 | Daniil Kvyat | Toro Rosso-Ferrari | 1’37.847 | 1’37.297 | 58 |
17 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’38.313 | 1’37.449 | 48 |
18 | Felipe Nasr | Sauber-Ferrari | 1’38.184 | 1’37.547 | 44 |
19 | Kevin Magnussen | Renault | 1’37.664 | 21 | |
20 | Romain Grosjean | Haas-Ferrari | 1’37.886 | 1’37.789 | 47 |
21 | Pascal Wehrlein | Manor-Mercedes | 1’40.627 | 1’37.878 | 60 |
22 | Esteban Ocon | Manor-Mercedes | 1’40.036 | 1’37.990 | 64 |
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curmudgeon (@curmudgeon)
30th September 2016, 15:22
Wish the graph would show which rubber the usual suspects were running during the long run. Teams usually split the test. Oh well.
MarkM
30th September 2016, 15:32
Alonso’s pace looks promising with the engine upgrade! Anyone know what tires he put that time on?
evered7 (@evered7)
30th September 2016, 15:32
Kimi’s pace is very good actually. Only caveat is that he ran very early in the session. Either way, a good battle on the cards if all make it out of first lap without any damage
Stephen Crowsen (@drycrust)
30th September 2016, 17:07
Looking at the top 10 drivers, only 4 of them did 60 or more laps over the course of FP1 and FP2: Hamilton (60), Rosberg (61), Perez (60), and Hulkenberg (63). Out of all the cars only two other drivers did 60 or more laps, and that was Wehrlien (60) and Ocon (64).
Henrik
30th September 2016, 17:28
Significantly, all of whom are Mercedes-powered.
Basbozz (@basbozz)
30th September 2016, 22:27
Can we just stop trying to make Mercedes look catchable every weekend. It is the same story every weekend, and every time the outcome is the same and everyone except Mercedes is dissapointed again. The only way they are catchable in the final gp’s are accidents like Spain or mechanical failures. Monaco was the only exception and Singapore was fairly close, but in the last gp’s of this season, the other teams have no chance to get close anymore……..
CarWars (@maxv)
1st October 2016, 6:56
Agreed, nonsense, that they are close. Mercedes will dial up the engine in the race when anyone gets close etc. Etc..
Let the rain gods make it rain every race. Or Bernie to turn on the sprinklers. Only hope for fun.
Bobby (@f1bobby)
1st October 2016, 11:24
Agreed. Someone in the media should be bold enough to stop spinning the excitement and reflect the sport realistically.
It’s a race to the first corner tomorrow and everyone knows it.
pcxmac (@xsavior)
2nd October 2016, 4:51
its been like this for the last 2.5+ years.
Bobby (@f1bobby)
1st October 2016, 11:21
“Encouraging pace for Mercedes’ rivals” – how many times have we heard that over the past three years?
Headline should read “Mercedes sandbagging, assured victory on Sunday”
Andrew Purkis
1st October 2016, 15:07
the mercs are having a laugh really, they have the same if not bigger advantage since 2014 approx 0.7s/lap depending on circuit
they could lap the field if they wanted to push it and have reliability issues
think about it, if they hadnt run into each other in spain they would probably win ALL the races this season
remeber they are on for beating the maccas 1988 record of 11 wins in a row again
this is total domination
pcxmac (@xsavior)
2nd October 2016, 4:53
it could be even worse next year. Ironically, Lewis is the only thing keeping Mercedes from looking honest. And I stress, looking. :)