Hamilton pips Rosberg – then hits trouble

2014 United States Grand Prix second practice

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Lewis Hamilton narrowly edged team mate and championship rival Nico Rosberg in second practice – but was then sidelined with a technical problem.

Rosberg initially set the pace when the pair did their performance runs on the soft compound tyre, beating Hamilton by 0.053 seconds. But unlike his team mate Hamilton chose to do another lap, and despite being advised the tyres would drop off by two-tenths of a second, he found a small improvement to pip Rosberg by three thousandths of a second.

Hamilton’s session came to an early end, however. Shortly after reporting a problem with an upshift he was called into the pits for attention to his car.

Rosberg also said he had a problem with a gear change during the session, but his car kept running.

The two Mercedes asserted their usual performance margin over the rest, with Fernando Alonso over a second off Hamilton’s pace in third.

Daniel Ricciardo had a more productive outing in the Red Bull and ended up fourth-quickest. Sebastian Vettel, however, was the slowest of the 18 runners after spending half an hour in the pits at the beginning of the session.

Both the Lotus drivers continued to struggle – first Romain Grosjean and then Pastor Maldonado had spins during the session. Grosjean also experienced trouble with his MGU-K.

As in the first practice session, a test of the new Virtual Safety Car was conducted at the end.

Pos.No.DriverCarBest lapGapLaps
144Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’39.08518
26Nico RosbergMercedes1’39.0880.00334
314Fernando AlonsoFerrari1’40.1891.10429
43Daniel RicciardoRed Bull-Renault1’40.3901.30530
519Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes1’40.4571.37236
67Kimi RaikkonenFerrari1’40.5431.45832
726Daniil KvyatToro Rosso-Renault1’40.6311.54634
820Kevin MagnussenMcLaren-Mercedes1’40.6411.55638
922Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Mercedes1’40.6981.61336
1027Nico HulkenbergForce India-Mercedes1’40.8001.71525
1177Valtteri BottasWilliams-Mercedes1’40.8281.74337
128Romain GrosjeanLotus-Renault1’41.0541.96931
1325Jean-Eric VergneToro Rosso-Renault1’41.1102.02536
1411Sergio PerezForce India-Mercedes1’41.1232.03835
1513Pastor MaldonadoLotus-Renault1’41.1582.07337
1699Adrian SutilSauber-Ferrari1’41.3322.24733
1721Esteban GutierrezSauber-Ferrari1’41.4202.33534
181Sebastian VettelRed Bull-Renault1’43.9804.89519

Image © Daimler/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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17 comments on “Hamilton pips Rosberg – then hits trouble”

  1. OmarR-Pepper (@)
    31st October 2014, 20:36

    Is’nt that usual? (Hamilton getting 1st on practice and stalling then) Maybe Hamilton sees how to reach the edge , so he controls that during the actual race.

  2. Well, hopefully, he hits trouble on the race day too.

    1. No, I hope not. I want to see a fair fight between Lewis and Nico on Saturday and Sunday. I don’t want any mechanical failures from Lewis and Nico for the rest of the season.

    2. It’s right to fear Lewis in a reliable car :)

  3. Unlucky for Lewis, but the mechanics have plenty of time to fix his car for tomorrow.

  4. Two very good drivers in like cars. It would be a shame if mechanical issues dictated the championship

    1. Or stupid double points.

    2. @f1aroo Or if a driver taking out the other one decided the championship.

      Oh wait…

      1. That’s a great point. The suggestion that only double points orechanical failures in the last race can artificially affect the championship is wrong. You have to consider the whole season.

      2. or doing a professional fowl in qualifying….oh,hang on!

        1. did i just spell foul like that..

        2. LOL A big +1 for both of you!

    3. Mechanical issues already had a major influence on the championship. Hamilton could be 70 points ahead already if both had had perfect reliability. Instead he’s only 17 ahead now.

  5. Paddy said that Lewis’ car had three separate, unrelated problems. A hydraulic fluid leak, I guess the gearshift and one he didn’t say what it was.

  6. This is going to be a total walkover. Merc’s advantage this weekend is as big as it was in Barcelona and Silverstone.

  7. I cant help but chuckle when one driver ‘pips’ another – in French slang a ‘pipe’ (sounds like pip) is ummm a certain kind of activity involving ummm, well you know the joke about whats better than one rose on a piano?

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