"Cato Batista" 10/09/2011 23:41:57 ID #115
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Two issues emerged as top priority for the teams after the first round of practice sessions today: the soft tires are a lot faster than the medium, and with the double DRS zones for Sunday a difficult decision has to be made: either set up the car for QF or for the race...
With warmer temperatures for the weekend the difference in laptimes between the 2 compounds seems to be increasing, that’s making the teams to be very careful with the number of soft sets they use. Best example was ROS who was 22nd but save all his option tire sets for Saturday and Sunday. But the biggest challenge will be to set up minimum wing on the car to take full advantage of DRS-open qualifying rules or to optimize it for race day when DRS is only allowed in 2 designated zones. This could well result in the top cars on the grid being easy to get pass during the race...
McLaren was the car to have on Friday, only Vettel got on top on the last moment of P2 when Hamilton run into traffic in his last lap. Laptimes where slower on the second session, something we rarely see.
P1- HAM (1.23.865) BUT VET WEB SUT PET ALO MAS PER ALG
P2- VET (1.24.010) HAM SCH MAS ALO WEB BUT PER KOB SEN
Times from P2 could be more noteworthy than the earlier session when teams were doing short runs for settings evaluation and systems check. Most of the important testing including long runs and tire set up were done on P2 . (surprised to find Schummi 3rd?)
The question is: Mercedes-power vs. Red Bull aero balance – Hamilton vs Vettel...This could be the best and last chance this year to stop Red Bull from getting the pole -their 13th straight.
As I said, to win the pool you need QF results. No pressure then...
Cato – HAM VET BUT
Good luck!