FP1 & FP2 - German GP report: Renault F1

Renault Sport Formula One Team drivers Esteban Ocon, Kevin Magnussen and Jolyon Palmer completed a full programme of running on the first day of the German Grand Prix. Across the three drivers a total of 158 laps of the Hockenheimring was completed with Kevin the quickest of the three drivers, posting a 1min 18.056secs as his best lap.

Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director - Technical programme notes
— Esteban did a solid job in the morning finishing half a tenth off Kevin’s time with a decent programme completed despite a small issue with his power steering which was quickly rectified. There were no issues for Kevin’s morning.
— The afternoon session saw Kevin and Jolyon on track for the greatest number of laps of any team in the session, completing an extensive tyre and long run programme.
— Pirelli’s soft (yellow) compound tyres were used in the morning FP1 session, the soft and supersoft (red) tyres were used in the afternoon’s FP2 session.

Esteban Ocon

“We managed to go through all the test items we were supposed to do and I’m happy with my performance throughout the session. I was the same speed as Kevin which is very promising; I was quite pleased with that. We had a little issue with the power steering but didn’t lose much time because of that; I think it went well overall.”

Kevin Magnussen

“I completed plenty of laps today and we didn’t have any issues with the car, which is always promising. We do have a few areas to work on but we did make decent progress through the day. We can make some improvements on how we use the supersoft tyre and with our brake balance too. That’s all part of the work we do on Friday then overnight ahead of tomorrow’s final practice and qualifying.”

Jolyon Palmer

“This morning was pretty easy for me as I wasn’t in the car so this afternoon was pretty full. We ran a good number of laps in the afternoon – the joint highest tally - but it’s fair to say we still have some improvements to be made with the car. The good thing is we have a lot of data and as we saw in Budapest it is possible to unlock quite a bit more pace.”

Bob Bell, Chief Technical Officer

“A good day’s work. We completed a promising run programme with plenty of laps from all three drivers. We finished pretty much all of our planned assessments which means we have all the information we require to make an educated decision on direction for qualifying tomorrow and the race on Sunday.”