Max P6 in second free practice: “Positive first day”
Published on 11 November 2016 by Mike Motilall
Max Verstappen finished the second free practice at Interlagos in sixth place, seven tenths a stray from Lewis Hamilton. With the Mercedes ahead and the Williams-duo surprisingly as the second team, Red Bull Racing followed in third. Verstappen was exactly one tenth down on his team mate. But on the other hand, the race pace of Max looked quite promising again.
“The first day here in Brazil was positive. The first free practice went very well”, Max tells Verstappen.nl. “After that we made some changes on the car, but they didn’t work out well for the short run in the second free practice. The long run was okay on the other hand, that looked pretty good.”
“Interlagos is a track that is difficult for the tyres”, Max explains when asked about the degradation of the soft tyres. “It is quite normal that the degradation is a bit higher on the softs here. In general they performed well, as expected.” Asked about his chances, Max answers: “Mercedes is too quick, but after them it’s us. Maybe in the rain, we have a chance to beat them, so hopefully it will fall Sunday. That would make it exciting.”
Max starts his first run on the medium compound tyres and reports on the radio that wind is getting in his helmet despite having a closed visor. Nevertheless, he clocks the second fastest time, a tenth a stray from his Australian team mate. While Kimi Raikkonen and Carlos Sainz tango with each other, resulting in it getting investigated by the stewards, Max improves to a 1:13.787, but remains in second. Not much later Hamilton, Rosberg and Bottas better his time, while Max is in the pits.
After about half an hour, the soft tyres are brought out. Ricciardo clocks the fastest tie, but that is snatched away by Felipe Massa, who is driving his last home race in front of the Brazilian crowd. Max switches to the softs and gets out on track, despite a nice drift in turn two, he improves himself to P4 (1:12.928). But the Mercedes have yet to do their running on the softs. Hamilton and Rosberg venture out in battle mode to hunt down the fastest time, demoting Max to P6.
With still over fifteen minutes remaining, Max continues his schedule on a scrubbed set of soft tyres. By now all the teams have switched focus to the long runs in preparation of the race. Improving of lap times is now of lesser importance.
With a little less than ten minutes remaining, Fernando Alonso is told to shut down his McLaren due to technical problems. Behind the guard rails he makes the best of a bad situation and positions himself behind the control and monitor of a remotely controlled camera.
By now, Max has a slight oversteer moment in the corners and heads back for the pits after sixteen laps on the same set of softs, only to switch back to another scrubbed set of mediums. On those, the Dutchman completes some very competitive lap times, hints of a good race pace. Even after reporting on the radio that his tyres are worn, his race pace remains up to par.
In the final minute, Sebastian Vettel gets full on the kerbstones causing a piece of body work to come loose from his Ferrari. This has no further consequence and the Mercedes round up the session as the leaders on the board, followed by the surprisingly strong Williams’ and both Red Bull Racing-cars ahead of the Ferrari’s.
Brazilian Grand Prix - Autódromo José Carlos Pace - Friday 11 November
FREE PRACTICE 2 RESULTS 01 44 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:12.271 41 02 6 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:12.301 +0.030s 40 03 77 Valtteri Bottas Williams Mercedes 1:12.761 +0.490s 47 04 19 Felipe Massa Williams Mercedes 1:12.789 +0.518s 43 05 3 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull Racing TAG Heuer 1:12.828 +0.557s 43 06 33 Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing TAG Heuer 1:12.928 +0.657s 45 07 5 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1:13.002 +0.731s 45 08 7 Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 1:13.047 +0.776s 24 09 27 Nico Hulkenberg Force India Mercedes 1:13.299 +1.028s 42 10 22 Jenson Button McLaren Honda 1:13.440 +1.169s 19 11 14 Fernando Alonso McLaren Honda 1:13.572 +1.301s 18 12 26 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso Ferrari 1:13.689 +1.418s 46 13 55 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso Ferrari 1:13.801 +1.530s 47 14 11 Sergio Perez Force India Mercedes 1:13.918 +1.647s 38 15 8 Romain Grosjean Haas Ferrari 1:14.074 +1.803s 35 16 20 Kevin Magnussen Renault 1:14.109 +1.838s 47 17 12 Felipe Nasr Sauber Ferrari 1:14.309 +2.038s 40 18 31 Esteban Ocon MRT Mercedes 1:14.317 +2.046s 46 19 30 Jolyon Palmer Renault 1:14.436 +2.165s 43 20 21 Esteban Gutierrez Haas Ferrari 1:14.558 +2.287s 42 21 9 Marcus Ericsson Sauber Ferrari 1:14.695 +2.424s 21 22 94 Pascal Wehrlein MRT Mercedes 1:14.958 +2.687s 22Click here to enter our competition and a chance to win Red Bull Racing sweat jacket!
