Massa leads wet practice at Silverstone

The F1 teams were hoping to get some good running today, in order to gauge the impact of the exhaust clampdown, but will have to hope for some dry weather tomorrow.

Friday’s practice was marred by rain showers, especially in the afternoon. Heavy rain at the start of the second session soaked the track and the teams lost approximately 45 minutes as they waited for the conditions to improve.

Felipe Massa eventually posted the fastest time ahead of Nico Rosberg and Kamui Kobayashi.

How the session panned out :

As the light went green, rain was pouring down on Silverstone. Only Timo Glock, Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastian Buemi ventured out… and quickly came back in the pits. Kamui Kobayashi was next to join the track at the wheel of his freshly repaired Sauber. He safely completed an installation lap and pitted.

Silence then fell on the circuit as there was too much standing water on the track… and it was still raining.

Half of the session was gone when it stopped raining. Some drivers soon came out for a first proper run. Alguersuari posted the first time on the board but was soon challenged by his teammate Buemi and Force India’s Sutil.

Schumacher also joined the party but Alguersuari kept the upper hand. Buemi and Sutil eventually bettered the Spaniard’s benchmark. Maldonado was up in 4th place

Track conditions were slowly improving, encouraging Alonso and Webber to come out and judge the situation by themselves. While the Australian jumped up to 4th in the standings, the Ferrari driver didn’t complete a timed lap and pitted.

Vettel was next to join the track. He was followed by Ricciardo, Massa and Button.

It was not long before Webber took over at the front from Mercedes’ Schumacher. Alonso moved up to P2 while his teammate Massa slotted in P4.

As Webber was back in the Red Bull garage and out of his car, he was pushed down the order.

Many drivers improved in the final minutes of the session and it was Massa who ended up quickest. The Ferrari driver beat Rosberg by 0.7s while third-placed Kobayashi was 0.7s further behind. Hamilton and Button completed the top five.