Japanese GP, Free Practice 2: best time for Webber

Mark Webber set the best time in the second free practice session of the Japanese Formula 1 GP. At Suzuka the Australian from Red Bull Racing preceded the McLaren of Lewis Hamilton and the other Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel. Excellent performance for Nico Hulkenberg, fourth with Force India, ahead of Fernando Alonso's Ferrari. Sixth time for Romain Grosjean with Lotus ahead of Jenson Button's McLaren and Bruno Senna's Williams. Felipe Massa (Ferrari) and Michael Schumacher (Mercedes) close the top 10.

The session was interrupted after just six minutes due to Paul di Resta exiting. The Force India driver put two wheels on the dirt at the entrance to Spoon. The car overturned and ended up in the barriers, with no damage to the driver.

At the restart Alonso took the lead with 1.34.287, beaten shortly afterwards by Button with 1.34.150 while Webber moved into second place with 1.34.1388. After the first half hour Vettel took to the track on hard tires lapping in 1.33.961. At that moment almost all the riders started using the Pirelli soft tyres.
Kobayashi was the first to mount them, taking second place. Button then took the lead, overtaken by Grosjean with 1.33.107. Then Vettel also mounted the softs, taking the lead with a 1.32.826, which was then improved by Hamilton. In the end Webber won with 1.32.493.

Kimi Raikkonen spent much of the session in the pits due to a KERS battery overheating problem. On Nico Rosberg's car the engine was replaced while on Schumacher's the suspension was replaced after a Spoon went off the track.

In the final 10 minutes of the session the teams completed long runs on the soft tyres. At the end Vitaly Petrov parked his Caterham at turn 1 after losing his rear wing on the straight.

F1 GP Japan – Suzuka – Free Practice Results 2

Pos Driver Team Time Laps 1. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m32.493 34 2. Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes 1m32.707s + 0.214 32 3. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1m32.836s + 0.343 37 4. Nico Hulkenberg Force India -Mercedes 1m32.987s + 0.494 30 5. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m33.093s + 0.600 28 6. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m33.107s + 0.614 35 7. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m33.349s + 0.856 22 8. Bruno Senna Williams -Renault 1m33.499s + 1.006 35 9. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m33.614s + 1.121 32 10. Michael Schumacher Mercedes 1m33.750s + 1.257 13 11. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m33.866s + 1.373 19 12. Sergio Perez Sauber-Ferrari 1m33.903. 1.410s + 36 13 1. Kamui Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari 33.9m3$1.490s + 33 14 1. Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 34.291m1.798s + 12 15 1. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 34.300m1.807s + 33 16 1. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 34.863m2.370s + 32 17 1. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 35.080m2.587s + 34 18 1. Heikki Kovalainen Caterham-Renault 35.711m3.218s + 41 19 1. Vitaly Petrov Caterham-Renault 35.870m3.377 37s + 20 1 36.194. Timo Glock Marussia-Cosworth 3.701m32s + 21 1 36.636. Charles Pic Marussia-Cosworth 4.143m28s + 22 1 37.342. Pedro de la Rosa HRT-Cosworth 4.849m30s + 23 1 37.701. Narain Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 5.208m35 .24s + 2 XNUMX XNUMX. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes No time XNUMX