James Calado quickest on Day 2 in Barcelona

ART Grand Prix driver finishes second day of pre-season test on top

By Franck Drui

6 March 2013 - 17:38
James Calado quickest on Day 2 in (…)

The 2012 GP2 Series best rookie James Calado was the quickest man today on a damp Circuit de Catalunya in this morning’s session with a laptime of 1:50.218. Johnny Cecotto topped the timesheet in the afternoon a shy nine hundredth away from Calado.

The second day of GP2 Series pre-season testing opened this morning in cold temperatures as the rain poured down. The drivers put their wet weather Pirelli tyres to good use as soon as the green light flashed in the pitlane. Daniel Abt was the early pace setter for ART Grand Prix, but it was his teammate Calado who set the record straight and put in a laptime of 1:50.218 ahead of Felipe Nasr whose best efforts put him sixth tenths away from the Brit. Adrian Quaife-Hobbs ended another seven tenths behind the Brazilian. Behind the top three, Rene Binder, Abt, Mitch Evans, Tom Dillmann, Marcus Ericsson, Cecotto and Kevin Giovesi rounded up the top ten. The session was briefly red flagged twice, first when Abt went off track and clipped the barrier at turn 4 putting a premature end to his morning’s endeavours. The second red flag was issued when Cecotto also went wide at Turn 4 in the closing minutes of the session.

The rain held off during the lunch break and hopes were high that we would see a dry afternoon session just as we did yesterday. Simon Trummer set the early pace for Rapax, but his time was bettered by one tenth by Quaife-Hobbs in the opening hour. Unfortunately, the weather gods had decided that today would not be a dry one and the rain picked up again. A first red flag halted the proceedings as Riccardo Agostini stopped at turn 4. The session resumed and Quaife-Hobbs remained top. Two more red flags appeared when Julian Leal first went wide and into the gravel bed, and when Rene Binder ran off at turn 7.

Cecotto found some extra pace in the final hour to claim the top spot in a 1:52.781. No one could better that time. In the dying minutes and after a late red flag courtesy of Abt again who stopped at turn 4, Calado and Nasr put their head down to claim P2 and P3 respectively. Giovesi, Quaife-Hobbs, Trummer, Daniel De Jong, Stefano Coletti and Dillmann rounded up to the top ten.

The final day of testing will start tomorrow at 9am local time. The weather forecast expects a dry day.

Morning results

 

Driver

Team

Laptime

Laps

1.

James Calado

ART Grand Prix

1:50.218

30

2.

Felipe Nasr

Carlin

1:50.902

14

3.

Adrian Quaife-Hobbs

MP Motorsport

1:51.642

29

4.

Rene Binder

Venezuela GP Lazarus

1:51.689

17

5.

Daniel Abt

ART Grand Prix

1:52.034

24

6.

Mitch Evans

Arden International

1:52.176

24

7.

Tom Dillmann

RUSSIAN TIME

1:52.233

23

8.

Marcus Ericsson

DAMS

1:52.266

23

9.

Johnny Cecotto

Arden International

1:52.296

17

10.

Kevin Giovesi

Venezuela GP Lazarus

1:52.457

19

11.

Fabio Leimer

Racing Engineering

1:52.594

26

12.

Simon Trummer

Rapax

1:52.685

29

13.

Daniel De Jong

MP Motorsport

1:52.692

30

14.

Julian Leal

Racing Engineering

1:52.946

26

15.

Jake Rosenzweig

Barwa Addax Team

1:53.100

25

16.

Sergio Canamasas

Caterham Racing

1:53.160

21

17.

Stéphane Richelmi

DAMS

1:53.216

25

18.

Robin Frijns

Trident Racing

1:53.649

2

19.

Christopher Zanella

RUSSIAN TIME

1:53.772

23

20.

Conor Daly

Hilmer Motorsport

1:53.912

17

21.

Rodolfo Gonzalez

Trident Racing

1:53.994

12

22.

Jolyon Palmer

Carlin

1:54.075

18

23.

Stefano Coletti

Rapax

1:54.547

20

24.

Ma Qing Hua

Caterham Racing

1:54.857

22

25.

Riccardo Agostini

Hilmer Motorsport

1:55.077

16

26.

Rio Haryanto

Barwa Addax Team

1:55.366

30

Afternoon results

 

Driver

Team

Laptime

Laps

1.

Johnny Cecotto

Arden International

1:52.781

18

2.

James Calado

ART Grand Prix

1:52.878

28

3.

Felipe Nasr

Carlin

1:52.892

24

4.

Kevin Giovesi

Venezuela GP Lazarus

1:53.081

21

5.

Adrian Quaife-Hobbs

MP Motorsport

1:53.243

30

6.

Simon Trummer

Rapax

1:53.414

32

7.

Daniel De Jong

MP Motorsport

1:53.515

26

8.

Julian Leal

Racing Engineering

1:53.524

37

9.

Stefano Coletti

Rapax

1:53.818

14

10.

Tom Dillmann

RUSSIAN TIME

1:53.819

23

11.

Fabio Leimer

Racing Engineering

1:53.920

22

12.

Conor Daly

Hilmer Motorsport

1:53.983

22

13.

Stéphane Richelmi

DAMS

1:54.137

29

14.

Marcus Ericsson

DAMS

1:54.161

36

15.

Sergio Canamasas

Caterham Racing

1:54.240

18

16.

Rene Binder

Venezuela GP Lazarus

1:54.349

14

17.

Robin Frijns

Trident Racing

1:54.360

18

18.

Ma Qing Hua

Caterham Racing

1:54.494

33

19.

Mitch Evans

Arden International

1:54.513

17

20.

Rodolfo Gonzalez

Trident Racing

1:54.563

27

21.

Rio Haryanto

Barwa Addax Team

1:54.662

35

22.

Jake Rosenzweig

Barwa Addax Team

1:54.845

23

23.

Jolyon Palmer

Carlin

1:54.940

23

24.

Riccardo Agostini

Hilmer Motorsport

1:55.359

26

25.

Christopher Zanella

RUSSIAN TIME

1:55.425

12

26.

Daniel Abt

ART Grand Prix

1:55.770

26

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