Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull, Baku City Circuit, 2018

Ricciardo pips Raikkonen in second practice

2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix second practice

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Daniel Ricciardo narrowly beat Kimi Raikkonen to the fastest time in the second practice session for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The Red Bull driver’s best effort was a 1’42.795 which he set on ultra-soft tyres. He took a few laps to set the time, his tyres giving up more grip in his qualifying simulation run on a comparatively cool track where temperatures fell to 26C.

Raikkonen got within a tenth of a second of Ricciardo’s time. But his Ferrari team mate Sebastian Vettel ended up 11th-quickest after a trip down one of the escape roads at the track.

Max Verstappen recovered from his crash in first practice to set the third-quickest time, just over a tenth of a second behind his team mate. However he suffered another setback in the final minutes, cruising into the pits with an apparent technical problem on his RB14.

There was little to choose between the Mercedes pair though the silver cars lagged some way off the pace. Valtteri Bottas was over three-quarters of a second off Ricciardo’s benchmark time.

Lewis Hamilton, fifth, was only a tenth of a second ahead of Fernando Alonso’s McLaren, which led a closely-matched and varied midfield. The rest of the top 10 included Esteban Ocon’s Force India, Kevin Magnussen’s Haas and both the Renaults. Carlos Sainz Jnr was the quicker of the latter pair, enjoying a better session having been slowest in the first 90 minutes of running.

Despite complaining about the balance of his car Lance Stroll set the 14th-quickest time for Williams, putting them ahead of Toro Rosso and Sauber.

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Pos.No.DriverCarBest lapGapLaps
13Daniel RicciardoRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’42.79535
27Kimi RaikkonenFerrari1’42.8640.06933
333Max VerstappenRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’42.9110.11627
477Valtteri BottasMercedes1’43.5700.77525
544Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’43.6030.80831
614Fernando AlonsoMcLaren-Renault1’43.7000.90534
731Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes1’43.8141.01930
855Carlos Sainz JnrRenault1’43.8341.03936
920Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’43.9771.18229
1027Nico HulkenbergRenault1’44.0911.29633
115Sebastian VettelFerrari1’44.1271.33238
1211Sergio PerezForce India-Mercedes1’44.1421.34731
138Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1’44.4251.63027
1418Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes1’44.4591.66431
1510Pierre GaslyToro Rosso-Honda1’44.7121.91739
1616Charles LeclercSauber-Ferrari1’44.9402.14530
1735Sergey SirotkinWilliams-Mercedes1’45.0072.21233
1828Brendon HartleyToro Rosso-Honda1’45.0512.25636
192Stoffel VandoorneMcLaren-Renault1’45.2882.49329
209Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari1’46.0423.2479

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Second practice visual gaps

Daniel Ricciardo – 1’42.795

+0.069 Kimi Raikkonen – 1’42.864

+0.116 Max Verstappen – 1’42.911

+0.775 Valtteri Bottas – 1’43.570

+0.808 Lewis Hamilton – 1’43.603

+0.905 Fernando Alonso – 1’43.700

+1.019 Esteban Ocon – 1’43.814

+1.039 Carlos Sainz Jnr – 1’43.834

+1.182 Kevin Magnussen – 1’43.977

+1.296 Nico Hulkenberg – 1’44.091

+1.332 Sebastian Vettel – 1’44.127

+1.347 Sergio Perez – 1’44.142

+1.630 Romain Grosjean – 1’44.425

+1.664 Lance Stroll – 1’44.459

+1.917 Pierre Gasly – 1’44.712

+2.145 Charles Leclerc – 1’44.940

+2.212 Sergey Sirotkin – 1’45.007

+2.256 Brendon Hartley – 1’45.051

+2.493 Stoffel Vandoorne – 1’45.288

+3.247 Marcus Ericsson – 1’46.042

Drivers more then ten seconds off the pace omitted.

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2018 Azerbaijan 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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30 comments on “Ricciardo pips Raikkonen in second practice”

  1. Is McLaren low drag update (can I call it that?) only on Alonso’s car? Vandoorne has been quite off the pace.

    This is supposed to be a Mercedes circuit, are they struggling with anything specific?

    1. I thought Vandoorne WAS the low drag update on Alonso’s car?

      1. that was my initial thought too when they said they had a revolutionary solution.

        Wearing Kimoa sunglasses isn’t enough? Poor kid

      2. @mrboerns & @johnmilk – Top comments, made me laugh!

    2. Considering Bottas topped FP1, I don’t think they are struggling with anything. They must be running on a higher fuel load or derping around on slower tyres (didn’t get a chance to watch – someone confirm the compounds they used!)

      1. CrazyforSpeed
        27th April 2018, 16:07

        Bottas SS US US US
        Hamilton S US

        Source ad.nl

    3. That was what I was thinking. Alonso is in the top 10 for speed trap speeds and vandorne seems to be a lot slower around the track (although I can only find the top 10 speed trap speeds)

      It would make sense as they might not have had time to make parts for both cars.

      1. I recall Alonso was always the first driver to get the newest updates and several times in 2015 his car was the only one that had them during the race.

        1. I don’t know what’s the current situation, but they often try things on one car, and keep the other car as a benchmark. I guess Vandoorne, who was on Supersofts compared to Ultrasofts on Alo’s car could’ve been another reason…

    4. @johnmilk
      Seems like some teams split fp2 in to quali runs for a particular driver and only race pace runs for the other driver. It looks like Ferrari, Mercedes and Mclaren put kimi, Fernando and Valterri on quali runs. At least that’s what it seems like from the lap times.
      I wouldn’t read much in to the deficit between Alonso and Vandoorne or Vettel and raikonnen for now. It does look like Red bull and Ferrari are quicker though.

      1. @johnmilk

        Sorry. Ignore Mercedes putting Valterri on only quali. I’m confused between fp1 and fp2 timings. It’s been a long day 😐.

      2. @todfod it could be, but at least with Vettel, he made a mistake on his quali run

        Lets see the difference between the mclarens after fp3

    5. McLaren’s update is “sacking someone”.. that should solve all problems.
      Tim Goss left the building…

  2. 7-16 under half a second in FP1 was crazy but close front runner is something else.

  3. I noticed that the top four drivers all had a double letter in their names.

    Unfortunately, No’s 9, 11, 14, 19, and 20 also had double letters in their names.

    Bang goes a theory I was formulating.

  4. Alonso got slipstream off of a Renault car(probably Sainz) and that’s what brought him to 6th place. Due to long section after turn 15 slipstream seems to help a lot in improving lap times.

  5. Mercedes again struggling with ultra soft over 1 lap, burning it up after 1 sector.

    1. Based on what ? Hamilton was only a little off the best sector time in sector 3 on his best lap (0.05) with the engine turned up he’d likely have set the fastest final sector on his hot lap.If anything it seemed the Mercedes was taking a few laps to get them working.

  6. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.

  7. Nice recovery from Max, hopefully the engine issue is not too bad

    1. The most recent news it was only a malfunctioning sensor.
      The low revs was a precaution.

      1. Thanks for the info

        I have a feeling Max will get his 1st pole tomorrow

        1. @anunaki rose coloured glasses much?

        2. @anunaki

          I’m guessing he’ll take the win, but will probably start in P2 or p3

  8. Imagine if McLaren were still powered by Honda and had low top speeds and were forced to give their drivers a tow; everyone would have put the blame squarely on Honda, the fans, media, McLaren themselves. Being the only team with Honda, there was no other data pint to compare.
    It was so easy then to blame Honda for everything.

    1. they blame Tim Goss now.

  9. bennie johnston
    27th April 2018, 19:58

    Watching it today Alonso got a massive boost by being in the slipstream of a Merc down the home straight. Commentary said that was worth about half a second.

    1. So did Ric and Kimi. If I recall correctly.

  10. I didn’t get to see all of Raikkonen’s lap, but was he held up by HAM in sector 3? Anyone watch all fp2?

Comments are closed.