Monaco Grand Prix practice in pictures

Here are some photos from the Monaco Grand Prix practice from today:

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Alonso tops Monaco Friday Practice 2

Fernando Alonso led both Friday Practice sessions in Monaco today

Fernando Alonso made it two in a row today, by topping the second practice session of the Monaco Grand Prix weekend, as he did the first. This time, however, he was challenged much more by the other drivers.

This session proved to be much more difficult than the first, thanks to slightly damper conditions, as well as traffic on several occasions. Both Felipe Massa and Timo Glock ran wide at Snt Devote corner, for example. Michael Schumacher was repeatedly caught out by the new kerbs at the Turn 11 chicane.

Traffic proved to be a problem again, but not as you would expect. Felipe Massa went too slowly at the last corner, in preparation for the next lap, and Heikki Kovalainen squeezed through. This sort of situation may well prove to be a problem in qualifying, especially in Q1. For Massa’s next lap after this minor scare, he was holding up Timo Glock.

Then, light rain began to fall. It wasn’t hard enough to necessitate intermidiate tyres, but enough for the cars to have trouble. Lewis Hamilton had a moment at the Anthony Combes corner, but just about kept it together. Jaime Alguersuari nearly lost control at the Turn 11 chicane, like Kimi Raikkonen did in 2008, but very skilfully kept it out of the barriers.

Again, Alonso topped the session, but the other drivers were much closer than last time. Nico Rosberg was 2nd, and only one tenth back, and Sebastian Vettel was a further 9 hundreths behind. Felipe Massa was 2 hundreths slower than Vettel, and Michael Schumacher 2 hundreths again back from Massa. Then there was a gap of 5 hundreths of a second to Robert Kubica in 6th.

It was another relatively poor session for McLaren. Lewis Hamilton as 7th, after several near misses today. Jenson Button was 9th, but 4 tenths slower than Lewis. Mark Webber was another driver who was dissapointing, as he was 10th overall, and half a second slower than his team-mate.

The two Williams cars were 13th and 14th, with Hulkenberg leading Barrichello by two tenths of a second. Adrian Sutil again did much better than his team-mate Liuzzi, as Sutil was 8th, and 1.1 seconds quicker than Liuzzi in 15th.

The Lotus of Heikki Kovalainen was the fastest of the new teams. Lucas di Grassi split in between him and Jarno Trulli to get 20th. Timo Glock was 22nd, ahead of the two HRTs. It was a complete waste of a session for Bruno Senna, as his car is in need of the repair, and the team will have to wait until the parts are sent to them by Dallara. It is understood that it is a chassis problem, like Senna was saying last week. He therefore was the slowest of the grid this session.

Times from Monaco Friday Practice 2:

	Driver	Team	Fastest lap	Gap	# of Laps
1	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1.14.904		36
2	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes GP	1.15.013	0.109	40
3	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	1.15.099	0.195	48
4	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1.15.120	0.216	45
5	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes GP	1.15.143	0.239	38
6	Robert Kubica	Renault	1.15.192	0.288	39
7	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	1.15.249	0.345	32
8	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	1.15.460	0.556	42
9	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1.15.619	0.715	38
10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	1.15.620	0.716	28
11	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	1.15.746	0.842	44
12	Sebastien Buemi	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1.16.276	1.372	46
13	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	1.16.348	1.444	48
14	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	1.16.522	1.618	38
15	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	1.16.528	1.624	42
16	Pedro de la Rosa	Sauber-Ferrari	1.16.599	1.695	36
17	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	1.16.818	1.914	46
18	Jaime Alguersuari	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1.17.023	2.119	28
19	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	1.18.184	3.28	48
20	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	1.18.478	3.574	38
21	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	1.18.667	3.763	13
22	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	1.18.721	3.817	42
23	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	1.20.313	5.409	36
24	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	1.22.148	7.244	11

Alonso leads Monaco Friday Practice 1

Fernando Alonso set the pace in Monaco Friday Practice 1

Fernando Alonso set the pace for the start of the Monaco weekend, by topping the timesheets in Friday Practice 1. However, the Red Bulls weren’t far behind.

In the early part of the session, both McLarens of Button and Hamilton traded times, before Felipe Massa took the top spot. In fact, in the first half of the session, Alonso struggled slightly, having a sideways moment at the Anthony Noghes (the last) corner. However, when he went out later on, he beat all of his rivals with a 1.15.927.

The Red Bulls waited until the second half of the session to go out, as did the Force India drivers. However, in their case, Paul di Resta did not make an appearance, as the team felt they needed to develop as much as possible for this race. Sebastian Vettel went into second place 10 minutes from the end, only 0.073 seconds behind Fernando. Mark Webber was fourth, nearly four tenths back from his team-mate.

Robert Kubica had an excellent session, finishing third overall. He was consistently fast throughout, and was only 0.089 seconds slower than Alonso. Vitaly Petrov did not impress, though, as he was 14th, 1.7 seconds behind.

In the Mercedes pits, Michael Schumacher beat Nico Rosberg this time, though it was no fault of Nico’s. Michael was sixth fastest, 6 tenths behind Alonso, but Rosberg spent much of his time in the pits, due to an unspecified problem with the car. He only managed 15 laps, and was 11th.

Adrian Sutil once again got into the top 10, and once again Vitantonio Liuzzi failed to get anywhere near his team-mate. While Sutil was 9th, and right behind the McLarens, Liuzzi was 13th, 9 tenths slower than Adrian. It was a similar situation at Toro Rosso, where Sebastien Buemi impressed with 10th place. However, Jaime Alguersuari was an entire second slower than Buemi, and therefore was only 15th.

The Saubers were the slowest of the midfield, finishing 17th and 18th. Kamui Kobayashi had another eventful session, as he hit the barriers after the kerb at the swimming pool corner. The crash resulted in damaged suspension and no front wing. Despite this, he still set 32 laps, which was more than most of the field. Pedro de la Rosa set 38 laps in comparison.

The Virgin of Timo Glock was the fastest of the new teams for once. He impressed by only being 3.6 seconds slower than Fernando Alonso. The two Lotus drivers of Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli were behind Glock, half a tenth and 3 tenths slower respectively. Lucas di Grassi was a further 7 tenths slower than this group, ending up in 22nd.

The HRT drivers filled the back row again. Bruno Senna beat Karun Chandhok by two tenths, but set 22 more laps. This is because Chandhok spun his car at Massenet, and did not set a lap time after that.

At the end of the session, there were 22 cars out on track, which gave everyone a good impression of what will happen in Q1 on Saturday.

Times from Monaco Friday Practice 1:

	Driver	Team	Fastest lap	Gap	# of Laps
1	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1.15.927		32
2	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	1.16.000	0.073	27
3	Robert Kubica	Renault	1.16.016	0.089	28
4	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	1.16.382	0.455	25
5	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1.16.517	0.59	30
6	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes GP	1.16.589	0.662	21
7	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	1.16.647	0.72	32
8	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1.16.692	0.765	30
9	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	1.16.805	0.878	23
10	Sebastien Buemi	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1.16.857	0.93	31
11	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes GP	1.17.149	1.222	15
12	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	1.17.331	1.404	28
13	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	1.17.704	1.777	27
14	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	1.17.718	1.791	39
15	Jaime Alguersuari	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1.17.991	2.064	37
16	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	1.18.397	2.47	39
17	Pedro de la Rosa	Sauber-Ferrari	1.18.434	2.507	38
18	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	1.18.547	2.62	32
19	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	1.19.527	3.6	24
20	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	1.19.606	3.679	32
21	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	1.19.902	3.975	31
22	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	1.20.566	4.639	18
23	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	1.21.688	5.761	28
24	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	1.21.853	5.926	6