Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes, Shanghai International Circuit, 2019

Bottas pips Vettel in second practice

2019 Chinese Grand Prix second practice

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There was little to choose between Mercedes and Ferrari in the second practice session for the Chinese Grand Prix as Valtteri Bottas headed the times by less than three-hundredths of a second.

The Mercedes driver prevented Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel from topping both Friday sessions with a strong run through the middle sector of the lap, where he was almost two-tenths of a second faster than the Ferrari driver.

Max Verstappen made it three different teams in the top three, lapping two-tens of a second off Bottas in his Red Bull.

The Renault-powered teams enjoyed a strong session, all four cars featuring in the top 10. They were led by Nico Hulkenberg, with a new power unit in his RS19, who was just a few hundredths of a second off Lewis Hamilton’s fifth-placed Mercedes. Both Mercedes drivers suffered spins early in the session shortly after leaving the pits.

Charles Leclerc suffered a setback as he missed the second half of the session while the team checked the cooling system on his car as a precaution. The Ferrari driver was using the power unit which let him down in Bahrain today.

Daniil Kvyat also had problems in his Toro Rosso. The Honda technicians decided to change his power unit after becoming concerned with some of the readings from it during first practice. He ended up 13th fastest.

The Haas drivers were well down the order. Kevin Magnussen took 16th, though he was only three-tenths of a second away from being in the top 10. Romain Grosjean’s qualifying simulation was spoiled when the right-hand part of his front wing collapse, causing a lock-up at turn 14.

Alfa Romeo got Antonio Giovinazzi’s power unit problems sorted in time for him to do his first timed laps of the weekend in the second practice session. He ended up 18th ahead of the Williams pair.

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Pos.No.DriverCarBest lapGapLaps
177Valtteri BottasMercedes1’33.33037
25Sebastian VettelFerrari1’33.3570.02733
333Max VerstappenRed Bull-Honda1’33.5510.22129
444Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’34.0370.70732
527Nico HulkenbergRenault1’34.0960.76631
655Carlos Sainz JnrMcLaren-Renault1’34.1410.81136
716Charles LeclercFerrari1’34.1580.82813
84Lando NorrisMcLaren-Renault1’34.2960.96638
93Daniel RicciardoRenault1’34.3361.00632
1010Pierre GaslyRed Bull-Honda1’34.4551.12532
117Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’34.5511.22133
1223Alexander AlbonToro Rosso-Honda1’34.6341.30437
1326Daniil KvyatToro Rosso-Honda1’34.6941.36420
1418Lance StrollRacing Point-Mercedes1’34.7791.44937
1511Sergio PerezRacing Point-Mercedes1’34.7841.45435
1620Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’34.7881.45834
178Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1’35.7042.37432
1899Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’35.9142.58440
1988Robert KubicaWilliams-Mercedes1’36.1212.79138
2063George RussellWilliams-Mercedes1’36.2292.89935

Second practice visual gaps

Valtteri Bottas – 1’33.330

+0.027 Sebastian Vettel – 1’33.357

+0.221 Max Verstappen – 1’33.551

+0.707 Lewis Hamilton – 1’34.037

+0.766 Nico Hulkenberg – 1’34.096

+0.811 Carlos Sainz Jnr – 1’34.141

+0.828 Charles Leclerc – 1’34.158

+0.966 Lando Norris – 1’34.296

+1.006 Daniel Ricciardo – 1’34.336

+1.125 Pierre Gasly – 1’34.455

+1.221 Kimi Raikkonen – 1’34.551

+1.304 Alexander Albon – 1’34.634

+1.364 Daniil Kvyat – 1’34.694

+1.449 Lance Stroll – 1’34.779

+1.454 Sergio Perez – 1’34.784

+1.458 Kevin Magnussen – 1’34.788

+2.374 Romain Grosjean – 1’35.704

+2.584 Antonio Giovinazzi – 1’35.914

+2.791 Robert Kubica – 1’36.121

+2.899 George Russell – 1’36.229

Drivers more then ten seconds off the pace omitted.

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2019 Chinese 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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36 comments on “Bottas pips Vettel in second practice”

  1. Keith do you know the tyres that cars had on on their fastest laps?

    1. Top 4 used softest rubber for their fastest lap. Hamilton had some issues on track out of his control which compromised his lap.

      1. I thought Hamilton was on mediums for his fastest run; all the rest on softs.

          1. That was Vettel.

        1. That doesn’t mean it was his fastest run.

    2. As I’ve seen in the world feed graphics everyone set these times with softs.

    3. @bluechris

      Black round Pirellis.

  2. So we have 3 groups (And excluding Gio and Grosjean as they had issues)

    The Front
    A packed Midfield
    Williams.

    Maybe we need to award points to each group to encourage them all?

    1. So the Williams pair are gonna have a binary system then? :)

  3. In other news, Lance Jnr seems to be having the better of Checo.
    Underestimated Lance have we ? or too soon to be asking this ?

    1. Stroll jnr*.
      Not Lance Jnr*

      1. how about just Stroll? Lance is the only Stroll on the grid.

    2. Why even Jnr.? It’s not as if his dad is racing. Go down that road and it’s Verstappen Jnr, Hamilton Jnr, Vettel Jnr etc.?

      1. Vettel Sr though ;)
        @psynrg

    3. @webtel Stroll is getting the better of Perez? Why, is it because he beat him by five thousands in an FP2? Stroll was slower than Perez in both Aus and Bah. So no at the moment he’s estimated just right.

    4. After 2 races, nothing suggest that he is miles away from Perez as many (me included) thought it would be.
      The other surprise comes from Gasly, not sure anyone expected him to beat consistently Verstappen, but he should regularly be in the top 6 with his RBR. Not quite the case thus far.

      Still early days though!

      1. @jeanrien
        He certainly isn’t miles away. But in terms of extracting performance, he has so far shown that he isn’t as bad as most of us once thought him to be. Outclassed Sergio in Australia and might end up doing the same here. Lets keep a watch.

        @montreal95–its a game/sport of fine margins. Nevertheless, i agree its too early to rate him. A couple of practice sessions and a race don’t/won’t dictate his potential.

        @frood19 @psynrg Thanks. My bad. I will stick to Lance.

        1. @webtel in Autralia he benefited from a better tactic due to the Giovanazzi “situation”

        2. @webtel If you think he was faster than Perez in Aus then what can I say? keep deluding yourself.

          1. Calm down m8 it’s only the internet. We’re all bots and none of this is real.

      2. He is not even close to Max, which is somewhat of a worry for RedBull, there are a number of drivers that are better than Gasly.

        1. @jureo They must find the cause of his problem. He was really fast last year in Bahrain in the Toro Rosso and this year he was slower in a RBR. Clearly he hasn’t suddenly lost his speed in one year. It’s not solely the responsibility of the driver to understand why he can’t get the best out of this particular car

    5. @webtel

      How is Lance getting the better of Perez. He was much slower in Australia.. But lucked in to the points be usee if the giovinazzi train. He was slower in Bahrain as well. Just because he went less than a hundredth of a second quicker in Fp2 doesn’t mean anything.

      1. @todfod : I checked the lap times in Aus. He was consistently matching Sergio if not a touch faster than him at times. Maybe Sergio was was caught up. i don’t quite remember. He was definitely slower in Bahrain. And i agree, FP times dont mean anything. But he has been setting better times in most of the FP sessions so far; perhaps i am getting carried away and deluded by that. Still way too early to infer anything as i have already mentioned.
        @johnmilk : yes, i am aware. i didn’t consider the finish.
        @montreal95 : I am not saying anything in the definite. Just that most of us rated Lance as a below average driver. I am only saying that he is proving to be better than that.

        1. @webtel Yup…pace-wise, Stroll was on par with Perez in Australia. He managed to finish ahead of Perez due to luck, but made an excellent start and stuck to Perez’s rear wing like glue until the latter’s pit stop. He was slower in Bahrain, but his start was also heavily compromised thanks to the collision with Grosjean and the subsequent pitstop, dropping him down to the tail end of the order (Stroll had another fantastic getaway from the line).

          I also agree that he has much to prove still, we’re only two races in…but I haven’t seen him getting “absolutely destroyed” by Perez, as some here had thought/predicted.

  4. How did the Haas drivers end up that slow??? I’m not complaining though.. I would much rather see a Mclaren vs Renault fight for best of the rest this weekend.

    Gasly.. still nearly a second down on his teammate. Ricciardo finally looking quicker than Hulkenberg. The championship leader looks like he could be in the hunt this weekend. Leclerc looking a little off from his performance last weekend. Should be an interesting quali and race this weekend.

    1. Prarag Chopra
      12th April 2019, 10:24

      Hulkenberg is still 2.5 tenths quicker than Ricciardo. But Riccciardo definitely seem to be closer to him this weekend. Hope they have a clean quali session tomorrow.

    2. Ricciardo finally looking quicker than Hulkenberg.

      “Looking” for some maybe.. but the numbers show a different story

      Nico Hulkenberg – 1’34.096

      Daniel Ricciardo – 1’34.336

      1. RIC still beat VER 3 out of 3.

    3. @todfod as others had said, DR looks a bit closer to NH at the moment but not yet ahead

  5. This is just the second time Leclerc will race on this track and he needs all the track time to learn more about this track but it seems all the bad luck finds Leclerc in the red team.

    1. This is f1 mate, drivers are expected to be on the pace after about 10 laps, and all of them are. They get heaps of simulator driving to prepare. F1 race tracks are not hard to learn for drivers that have made it to F1. If anything they are often great straight away, then struggle later in career on the same tracks through things like car setup, ie ricciardo at the moment. Learning the tracks is one of the easiest things to learn for an f1 driver. Getting the car to work correctly is the harder part

  6. It feels like there is 1 red bull and 3 toro rosso this year lol

  7. https://streamable.com/eh7dl
    Robert Kubicas best onboard from fp1. Car looks more stable than first 2 races. Kubica said after fp2 that the team worked hard on working out why kubicas chassis has had more issue than Russells even changing over parts between the cars. Kubicas chassis has done over 5000km, as it was the chassis also used in testing, while Russel is about 1000km in. Still Williams were about 8 tenths slower than last year’s fp2….

  8. If I read it correctly, by race 3 only the Mercedes PUs are yet to suffer technical issues, right?

Comments are closed.