Formula One News » Hamilton and Rosberg share Friday practice honours in Spain Posted on 08/05/2015

Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg shared the honours on Friday in practice for the 2015 F1 Spanish Grand Prix.

Hamilton managed a 1m 26.852s lap in the afternoon session at the Circuit de Catalunya, leaving him 0.408s up on Sebastian Vettel’s Ferrari and 0.764s up on Rosberg, who was only third, although the German’s quickest time in the morning – a 1m 26.828s – remained the best of the day overall, albeit by only 0.024s.

“It’s been a fairly decent day – mainly working on setup, tweaking the balance bit by bit,” said Hamilton, who leads the drivers’ championship by 27 points.

“It’s often hard to get a good comparison between the sessions with the track and wind conditions changing. The wind was quite strong at times today and really inconsistent around the lap. The car is quite affected by that and it was pretty hot out there in the afternoon too, so I think maybe the temperatures also had an effect on lap times.

“The priority was understanding the tyres and how they wear because, ultimately, the race is the most important part of the weekend. We’ve not analysed the times yet but our pace felt pretty strong.”

“It’s great to be back in Europe and back to this track, where we did so many laps in the winter tests,” added Rosberg, who will be looking to make inroads into his team-mate’s championship advantage this weekend.

“I worked a lot on race pace in the afternoon and was happy with my long run, where we seemed to be quicker than the Ferraris.

“On one lap I still have a bit of work to do to find some more speed, so I’ll be working hard with the team tonight to find out where I can improve. On track it was quite a difficult day for everyone, I think. The conditions were really strange and the track was very poor. I don’t know really why but hopefully it will be more predictable for qualifying and the race.”

Meanwhile, Vettel after coming third in FP1, was pleased to split the Mercedes’ in FP2, although he thinks Ferrari still has some way to go to get on terms with them.

“I think we can improve the cars, but the gap with Mercedes is still there. It was not the best lap today from me, but I believe that in these conditions it is difficult for everybody,” he confirmed.

Behind, Kimi Raikkonen was fourth in both sessions and reported he was struggling in the sister Ferrari: “It was quite a strange day. The position and laptimes were not too bad, but I was not completely happy with the handling of the car. I don’t know if it was caused by the wind or by the conditions of the track, but I have been struggling all day. We did not see anything bad with the upgrades we brought here. It’s just the feeling that it’s not completely right, as if the car was sliding,” he explained.

Daniil Kvyat was next up and fifth for Red Bull in the second session, with Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen sixth and Jenson Button an encouraging seventh in his McLaren.

“You simply can’t compare the car I drove today to the car I last tested here back in February; the difference is night and day,” Button stated.” Then, the last corner was easy-flat, whereas now it isn’t because of the extra grunt our Honda power unit is pushing out these days.

“We felt reasonably good on the Prime tyre this morning, but really struggled on it in the afternoon, when we were much better on the Option. So there’s a lot of work for us to do in every area to optimise what we have, and also to figure out why the car is doing certain things on track.”

Williams duo Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa wound up eighth and tenth, sandwiching Carlos Sainz Jr’s Toro Rosso. Sainz, like Rosberg, was slower in FP2, and his time in the morning would have left him just behind his team-mate in P6.

Local star and favourite Fernando Alonso finished just outside the top ten in P11, ahead of Romain Grosjean’s Lotus and Daniel Ricciardo’s Red Bull.

Grosjean and Ricciardo both had disrupted days. Grosjean lost time in FP2 when a bodywork fastener failed on the start-finish straight, littering the track with debris. Running was briefly halted as a result. The Frenchman, who sat out the morning while Jolyon Palmer drove his car, was limited to just 14 laps as a result.

Ricciardo’s running was similarly restricted, with the Aussie doing only 13 tours after having to install his fourth engine of the season.

Of the rest, Pastor Maldonado took 14th in his Lotus, losing time in the morning with a gearbox issue, while Sauber’s Felipe Nasr and Marcus Ericsson and the Force India’s of Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez filled positions 15 through to 17. Nasr and Hulkenberg were both slightly slower in FP2.

Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi came in 19th and 20th for Manor, more than two seconds off the Force Indias.

In addition to Palmer, Susie Wolff and Raffaele Marciello both got outings in FP1, replacing Bottas and Ericsson respectively. Marciello ended up 12th, with Palmer 13th and Wolff 14th.

Full practice 2 times available HERE.

Full practice 1 times available HERE.