Bahrain GP. FP1 Report. Lewis Hamilton set an early quick time that was never bettered in the opening practice session in Bahrain, as the drivers adjusted to the slippery circuit, almost everyone ignored the soft tyres, and Fernando Alonso had a nightmare. Hamilton's best time was set early in the session, or at least early in the bit of the session when there were actually cars on the track, and was never approached by any of the other cars, probably down to the ill-effects of some gusting winds (chortle) around the track, and a slight lack of fuel in Hamilton's car.
The time was set at the end of a fairly long multi-lap run that all the drivers favoured as the harder compound Bridgestone tyre took time to "rubber in" to the dusty track.
The only other cars to break the 1:34 barrier were the pair of BMW Saubers, who spent much of the 90 minutes scratching around in the midfield before becoming to only team to noticeably try the softer tyres and slingshot themselves to within three tenths of a second of Hamilton's time, with Nick Heidfeld going fractionally faster than his team mate Robert Kubica, for once.
Nico Rosberg was fourth in another strong practice performance for Williams, that will probably end up petering out into a disappointing result come Sunday. The German set his personal best on the harder tyre in the closing stages to move within 0.58 seconds of Hamilton, but the 2009 practice king could do no more.
Jenson Button was fifth fastest, having spent much of the session in the pits with an apparent gearbox glitch that affected his upshifting. Whether that was a minor problem that is now sorted or whether it will necessitate a gearbox change and associated grid penalty remains to be seen. The championship leader finished ahead of the second McLaren of Heikki Kovalainen and his team mate Rubens Barrichello.
Both Ferraris made the top ten, with the KERS-fitted car of Felipe Massa ending 8th, just over two tenths of a second quicker than Kimi Raikkonen's KERS-less machine. The Finn survived an early scare when he flew off the track on his opening run on the exit of turn two after getting a tankslapper on, narrowly missing the jutting edge of a hefty tyre wall as he broadsided across the infield. Raikkonen recovered to set the early pace, but had no answer to the pace of Hamilton and fell down the leaderboard.
China heroes Red Bull had an inauspicious start to the weekend, with Mark Webber sandwiched between the Ferraris in 9th and race winner Sebastian Vettel only 12th, while fellow early season form team Toyota also struggled, with Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock ending 15th and 17th respectively.
The Force India squad debuted their interim alliterative double-decker diffuser design and showed early signs of promise, relatively speaking, with both cars placing in the top ten towards the end of the session, slipping back to 14th for Adrian Sutil and 16th for Giancarlo Fisichella by the end. Well, that's promising for Findia, anyway.
Showing few signs of promise was Fernando Alonso, who spent most of the 90 minutes stuck to the foot of the timesheets, and managing to improve to only 18th after a late rally. The Spaniard finished ahead of only the Toro Rosso pair, with Sebastien Bourdais a dismal 19th and rookie of the year Sebastien Buemi ending the session last of all, partly due to a technical problem that saw his car grind to a halt at the side of the track with around 5 minutes remaining.
The teams now prepare for some solid running in FP2, where the outright pace of the McLarens and BMWs will be put under proper scrutiny.
| FP1 Times | ||||
| Pos | Driver | Car | Time | Laps |
| 1 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren - Mercedes | 1:33.647 | 19 |
| 2 | Nick Heidfeld | BMW Sauber | 1:33.907 | 17 |
| 3 | Robert Kubica | BMW Sauber | 1:33.938 | 17 |
| 4 | Nico Rosberg | Williams - Toyota | 1:34.227 | 24 |
| 5 | Jenson Button | Brawn - Mercedes | 1:34.434 | 15 |
| 6 | Heikki Kovalainen | McLaren - Mercedes | 1:34.502 | 24 |
| 7 | Rubens Barrichello | Brawn - Mercedes | 1:34.531 | 18 |
| 8 | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | 1:34.589 | 17 |
| 9 | Mark Webber | Red Bull - Renault | 1:34.827 | 21 |
| 10 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | 1:34.827 | 19 |
| 11 | Kazuki Nakajima | Williams - Toyota | 1:34.880 | 24 |
| 12 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull - Renault | 1:34.938 | 21 |
| 13 | Nelson Piquet Jr | Renault | 1:34.974 | 21 |
| 14 | Adrian Sutil | Force India - Mercedes | 1:35.021 | 18 |
| 15 | Jarno Trulli | Toyota | 1:35.036 | 22 |
| 16 | Giancarlo Fisichella | Force India - Mercedes | 1:35.042 | 16 |
| 17 | Timo Glock | Toyota | 1:35.333 | 20 |
| 18 | Fernando Alonso | Renault | 1:35.348 | 24 |
| 19 | Sebastien Bourdais | Toro Rosso - Ferrari | 1:35.353 | 22 |
| 20 | Sebastien Buemi | Toro Rosso - Ferrari | 1:35.369 | 15 |
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