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FP1 Report

The opening practice session of the breath-baiting Singapore night racing weekend was dominated by the title contenders, and seemed to indicate that there won't be much between them come the important stuff tomorrow and Sunday. Lewis Hamilton ended the session top, but Felipe Massa was breathing right down his neck. Metaphorically speaking.

The night race gimmick certainly gave a unique look to the session, with the cars on track shining brightly in the glare of the floodlights, with the Ferraris in particular looking just about as beautiful as a modern F1 car can look. But the reports of a 1:34 lap time soon looked a little silly. Right from the start, drivers were barely getting round the lap in under two minutes, and though the times tumbled as their confidence improved, the ultimate pace was still ten or so seconds off the prediction.

The early pace setters were the Toyota twins, Timo Glock ahead of Jarno Trulli, while the early casualty was Mark Webber, who unceremoniously slid into the wall next to the natty-looking tunnel section underneath a spectator grandstand and ended his session almost before it had begun. After the broken Red Bull car was removed, Fernando Alonso leapt to P1, as the likes of Massa and Raikkonen struggled to find a rhythm in their first couple of runs.

Lewis Hamilton's first foray onto the track at the mid point of the session yielded the top spot, and from then on, the fastest slot on the time sheets was pretty much his for keeps. Massa went quickest for a time, but Hamilton broke into the 1:45s and reasserted himself shortly after, improving on his own time twice to keep the Ferrari pair at arms length.

Though both Massa and Raikkonen had quick runs in the dying seconds of the session, Kimi pitted during his fastest lap (which probably would have been good enough for P1), while Massa fell fractionally short of pipping his title rival with a slightly slow final sector. All in all, the top three look to be on the same sort of pace, with Heikki Kovalainen and Robert Kubica just a fraction behind them.

Behind the "big five", the star performer was Nico Rosberg, who has targeted Singapore as the last chance for points this year, and started the weekend in hungry-enough form, taking 6th place in the final standings, ahead of Alonso and Nick Heidfeld, who was again performing less-favourably compared to his team mate Kubica.

Piquet Jr produced a fair enough performance to end 9th, while Jenson Button was performing heroics in the pathetic Honda, running in the top 6 for much of the session before fading to tenth place late on. Still impressive stuff. His team mate Rubens Barrichello was the other casualty of the session, spinning at the final corner and pranging his car's rear on the concrete. Quite a few drivers had issues at the final turn, and Sebastien Bourdais had pointed out that a white line on the track was a dangerous distraction for drivers through there.

Elsewhere, Italian GP winner Vettel returned to reality, finishing up in 11th place ahead of Kazuki Nakajima, Glock and Bourdais. Coulthard had a rubbish time of it in 15th, while the Force India twins were kept off the bottom of the sheets by the largely-absent Webber, and the largely-slow Jarno Trulli, who bafflingly completed 29 laps during the session, but could do no better than 19th.

First impressions then, are that though the track itself looks set to provide an overtaking-free race, the gimmick of night racing should be more than enough to keep everyone entertained for the duration. And as for the win, well that will be very closely-fought indeed.

FP2 Report

The battle at the front between the championship protagonists was invaded at the end of FP2, as Fernando Alonso plonked in a fast time right at the end to take the (limited) glory on offer.

For much of the session, it looked like Lewis Hamilton would follow up his fastest time in FP1 with another one here, but as he and title rival Felipe Massa headed for the pits early as the session drew to a close, Alonso stayed out to ping in the best time, albeit on the super soft tyres. Still, a promising session all round for the Renault man, who spent most of it near the top, and it bodes well for the team's efforts to cement 4th place in the constructors championship. Alonso ended the session ahead of Hamilton, Massa and ovalainen, with the impressive Nico Rosberg ahead of Robert Kubica in 5th.

The early pace was set by Rosberg. After messing up his first lap, the Williams driver topped the times from Heikki Kovalainen and Felipe Massa. It took Hamilton's first effort to finally displace the German, and from then on, Hamilton led most of the session, with Massa beating him after the hour mark, only for Hamilton to move back past later on, until Alonso ruined his fun.

All in all, the times between the top few were very close, and the fight for pole promises to be a staggeringly close one. At times there were mere thousandths of a second between Hamilton, Massa and Kovalainen, though Kimi Raikkonen had a less stellar time of it, and he ended some way back in 7th place.

Jenson Button continued his sterling work in a shash car with 8th, ahead of the second Williams of Kazuki Nakajima, who endured a few spins on his way to 9th place. Timo Glock rounded out the top ten, though he had a strange spin late on which damaged his front wing.

The damage from the first session to Mark Webber's car almost threatened to keep him out of the whole session, but the emchanics finally managed to piece his car back together and send him out with some 25 minutes to go. Under the circumstances, the Aussie did well to end the day 11th, ahead of a spin-loving Nelson Piquet Jr and the Toro Rosso pair of Bourdais and Vettel, and well clear of his trouble-free team mate David Coulthard, who ended the session down in 15th.

Nick Heidfeld chalked another disappointing performance up with 16th, ahead of only Fisichella and Sutil in the Force Indias, Rubens Barrichello's Honda and Jarno Trulli's Toyota, who had another paceless session, and was also hit with a 10000 Euro fine for bizarrely driving the wrong way around the track after recovering from a spin in FP1.

There were plenty of mistakes on display, with Piquet, Massa and Vettel providing most of them, as the circuit conditions continued to confuse the drivers.

Overall, the scene is set for a fascinating battle in qualifying tomorrow, with the difference between glory and humiliation looking set to be not very much at all.