Vettel finds good pace in final practice

Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull Racing found some good pace in the final practice session for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Overnight work from the Milton Keynes-based team seemed to have paid off this morning, with both RB7s looking more comfortable around the Hungaroring.

Vettel made the most of it and set the fastest time of the 60-minute session, 0.3s faster than Ferrari’s Alonso.

Button was third fastest for McLaren with Webber fourth. Both were within half a second of Vettel. Massa was a bit further down the road while sixth-placed Rosberg was 1.3s off the leading Red Bull’s pace.

Lewis Hamilton was eighth fastest, having failed to get the most out of his super soft tyres.

Schumacher and Petrov completed the top ten.

What happened during the session :

Sunny conditions greeted the field this morning. As the light went green, all 24 cars filtered out of the pitlane to complete an installation lap of the Hungaroring and sample the conditions. Renault’s Vitaly Petrov was last to rejoin the pits as he completed two installation laps.

Silence then fell on the circuit as the engineers were unloading the data and the mechanics making some adjustments on the cars.

Jérôme d’Ambrosio broke the silence some minutes later. As he embarked on a first timed lap, Kamui Kobayashi joined him on track. Trulli, Kovalainen and Rosberg followed seconds later. Other drivers left the pits and the session slowly came to life.

Those early runners cleaned the dust from the track, under the watchful eyes of the top teams who were happy to wait for better conditions.

The Mercedes drivers set the early pace but Jenson Button quickly joined the action and immediately moved on top of the timesheet. Rosberg tried to respond to the challenge but couldn’t match the McLaren driver’s pace, especially in the second split, and was eight tenths slower.

As Sebastian Vettel was on a first hot lap, his teammate Mark Webber slotted in 2nd behind Button. Then Lewis Hamilton lowered the benchmark…only for the reigning World Champion to smash it by six tenths of a second.

Webber managed to improve to join Vettel at the front but the German put the hammer down and pulled away from his rivals. Two minutes to the midway point, the Red Bull driver was eight tenths faster than anyone else. Hamilton and Webber slightly improved to close within six tenths of the pacesetter.

The Ferraris were yet to show their pace. Massa initially slotted in 5th place while Alonso was down in 16th position. The Spaniard improved to 4th but was 0.8s slower than Vettel.

The midfield runners then started to put super soft tyres on. They hauled Rosberg up to P2, half a second behind Vettel.

With 18 minutes remaining, Sebastian Vettel left the pits for another run. Webber and Hamilton did the same. All three of them were still using the harder compound. Hamilton pitted after a couple of laps while the Red Bulls stayed on track a bit longer. Webber took the opportunity to improve and moved up to 2nd behind his teammate.

In the meantime, Fernando Alonso kicked off a qualifying simulation run and set the fastest time, 0.5s faster than Vettel’s benchmark. Massa also improved but was marginally faster than the Red Bull driver, who was yet to bank in a lap on the super soft compound.

Alonso was able to find enough in his option tyres for two flying laps and made a brief stop in the pits before joining the track again. Meanwhile, Hamilton missed his braking at Turn 1 and cut his effort. He tried again next time round but was unable to improve. On the contrary, his McLaren teammate Button went 2nd fastest, 0.1s behind Alonso.

Thanks to a super fast third split, Mark Webber moved up to third place, 0.006s behind Button. Vettel did better and demoted Alonso to 2nd spot. With only seconds left, Webber was the only one of the frontrunners still on a good lap but remained in 4th place.

Fastest of the session, Vettel showed he may had a bit more in store with a quick in lap.