F1 2009 Race 1 Albert Park Melbourne

There's some controversy abt the diffuser. if they survive that, they have a chance...
but u never really know where teams stand before a race or two is over.


n..nikhil, u can create individual threads for the news if u want...we dont mind a bit of spamming initially just to get things goin ;)

pussycat dolls will win!!

Practice 1: Williams takes surprise 1-2




The Williams team cast aside the winter testing form book by taking a sensational 1-2 in the first practice session of the 2009 season in Melbourne.

Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima came on progressively stronger as the 90 minutes elapsed and pipped Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen in the dying moments.

The leading trio were blanketed by just 0.063s, half a second clear of the chasing pack.

Pre-event favourite Brawn GP – the team that has remarkably risen from the ashes of Honda Racing to set F1 alight with its new BGP 001 car – enjoyed a solid debut session, Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button finishing fourth and sixth respectively.

They were sandwiched by Heikki Kovalainen in the faster of the McLarens – indicating that the Woking team may be able to muster a respectable showing in Australia despite the teething problems it has experienced with its MP4-24 car.

Less promisingly, however, reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton managed only the 16th fastest time in the sister car after an untidy session.

Despite drastically lower downforce levels this year, Rosberg’s pacesetting lap of 1m26.687s was just 0.2s slower than Raikkonen’s yardstick in the corresponding session last season and fractionally faster than Hamilton’s 2008 pole time – showing just how much extra mechanical grip is afforded by the slick tyres.

Nonetheless the cars looked predictably nervous and twitchy as the drivers ventured out for their first tentative laps of the dusty 3.3-mile Albert Park temporary circuit in chilly early autumn weather.

Rookie Sebastien Buemi was the first man to put a time on the board, before Raikkonen emerged and steadily whittled the benchmark down to the mid-1m28s range despite a brief trip across the grass at the first chicane on one lap.

Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa had a wild moment on an early flier when he slid off under braking for the tight turn 15 and went down the escape road, rejoining after a swift spin turn.

Rosberg was already showing encouraging pace for Williams, going second quickest until he was demoted by a notably neat and tidy lap from Button in the Brawn.

Shortly after the halfway mark Kovalainen briefly moved to the top of the timing charts with a 1m27.982s lap, before Barrichello upped the ante to 1m27.743s.

A few minutes later Raikkonen used a set of soft-compound tyres to make a quantum leap in pace, uncorking a 1m26.750s.

The Ferrari looked stable and confidence-inspiring but the fine edge of the tyres’ performance had already worn off by the time Raikkonen was halfway round the next lap.

Nonetheless the Finn’s time remained unbeaten until the Williams pair’s impressive forays – on the harder rubber – at the very end of the session.

Behind the top six came Massa in the second Ferrari and Timo Glock in the quicker of the Toyotas, with Adrian Sutil an excellent ninth fastest for Force India.

Renault seemed to be struggling for grip, Fernando Alonso surviving several hairy moments en route to the 10th best time and Nelson Piquet spinning off after losing the R29 on the turn-in to the first chicane.

BMW had a low-key start to what it hopes will be a title-challenging 2009 campaign, finishing 11th (Nick Heidfeld) and 13th (Robert Kubica), split by Toyota’s Jarno Trulli.

Giancarlo Fisichella was 14th in the second Force India ahead of Buemi, who kept his nose clean and wound up the fastest of the four drivers from the Red Bull stable.

Toro Rosso team-mate Sebastien Bourdais bemoaned the low-grip track conditions and, as if to prove the point, languished in 19th place.

Meanwhile Red Bull Racing duo Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel completed only 11 laps between them due to technical problems.

Vettel ground to a halt on the circuit after 45 minutes when his RB5 lost hydraulic pressure, while a driveshaft problem stymied team-mate Webber.

The ‘green’ track conditions ensured there were plenty of grassy excursions but everyone managed to keep away from the concrete walls.


Australian GP free practice session one times

1. ROSBERG Williams 1m26.687s

2. NAKAJIMA Williams 1m26.736s

3. RAIKKONEN Ferrari 1m26.750s

4. BARRICHELLO Brawn 1m27.226s

5. KOVALAINEN McLaren 1m27.453s

6. BUTTON Brawn 1m27.467s

7. MASSA Ferrari 1m27.642s

8. GLOCK Toyota 1m27.710s

9. SUTIL Force India 1m27.993s

10. ALONSO Renault 1m28.123s

11. HEIDFELD BMW 1m28.137s

12. TRULLI Toyota 1m28.142s

13. KUBICA BMW 1m28.511s

14. FISICHELLA Force India 1m28.603s

15. BUEMI Toro Rosso 1m28.785s

16. HAMILTON McLaren 1m29.042s

17. WEBBER Red Bull 1m29.081s

18. PIQUET Renault 1m29.461s

19. BOURDAIS Toro Rosso 1m29.499s

20. VETTEL Red Bull 1m32.784s

rofl awesome

Oh dear!! It gets better and worse!

See this

Practice 2: Rosberg on top again



Nico Rosberg completed a superb opening day of the 2009 season for Williams by setting the pace once again in second practice at Albert Park.

The young German moved to the top of the timing charts one-third of the way through the 90-minute session and remained there for the remainder of the afternoon.

His closest challenger was Rubens Barrichello, just 0.1s behind in the Brawn BGP 001, with Jarno Trulli a further 0.2s adrift in the Toyota.

The fact that the three fastest cars happened to be those fitted with the controversial diffusers against which rival outfits lodged protests on Thursday was lost on nobody in the paddock…

Red Bull’s Mark Webber was quickest of those running more conservative diffuser designs, the local favourite putting a difficult morning session behind him to finish just 0.3s off the pace.

Jenson Button, Jarno Trulli and Kazuki Nakajima backed up their team-mate’s performances with fifth, sixth and seventh places for Brawn, Toyota and Williams respectively.

The session began under sunny skies but the track temperature dropped markedly as the 90 minutes progressed and there were few major lap time improvements in the second half.

During the busy opening stages Rosberg, an impressive Adrian Sutil, Button, Trulli and Glock traded the fastest time before the Williams driver took control with a lap in 1m26.293s.

He shaved another couple of tenths off that mark over his next few laps, ultimately clocking a best of 1m26.053s, some 0.6s inside his session one benchmark.

As the track temperature fell and the grip seeped away with it, Rosberg’s supremacy wasn’t threatened until the final moments when Barrichello improved to 1m26.157s.

The Ferraris were curiously unable to match their solid first practice pace, Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen languishing in 10th and 11th places respectively.

Raikkonen, in fact, was one of only two drivers (the other being Heikki Kovalainen) to lap more slowly in the second session than in the first.

Both he and Massa had several lurid moments, Massa providing one of the more spectacular sights as he wrestled a huge tank-slapper out of the fast turn 14.

Fernando Alonso spun harmlessly early in the session after taking too much kerb in turn four, but when Sebastian Vettel strayed his left-rear wheel onto the grass under braking for turn three, the Red Bull snapped around on him and stalled.

The German was sidelined from the final half-hour but nonetheless remained eighth on the timing charts ahead of Sutil – who again did a stellar job for Force India – Massa, Raikkonen and Alonso.

Giancarlo Fisichella was 13th in the other Force India, while the BMWs were surprisingly far back in 14th (Nick Heidfeld) and 15th (Robert Kubica), both drivers complaining of a lack of grip and poor balance.

McLaren’s plight was even worse, with Kovalainen and world champion Lewis Hamilton mired in 17th and 18th, behind the Toro Rosso of Sebastien Bourdais and 1.7s off the pace.

Renault’s Nelson Piquet and Toro Rosso debutant Sebastien Buemi brought up the rear.


Australian GP free practice session two times

1. ROSBERG Williams 1m26.053s

2. BARRICHELLO Brawn 1m26.157s

3. TRULLI Toyota 1m26.350s

4. WEBBER Red Bull 1m26.370s

5. BUTTON Brawn 1m26.374s

6. GLOCK Toyota 1m26.443s

7. NAKAJIMA Williams 1m26.560s

8. VETTEL Red Bull 1m26.740s

9. SUTIL Force India 1m27.040s

10. MASSA Ferrari 1m27.064s

11. RAIKKONEN Ferrari 1m27.204s

12. ALONSO Renault 1m27.232s

13. FISICHELLA Force India 1m27.282s

14. HEIDFELD BMW 1m27.317s

15. KUBICA BMW 1m27.398s

16. BOURDAIS Toro Rosso 1m27.479s

17. KOVALAINEN McLaren 1m27.802s

18. HAMILTON McLaren 1m27.813s

19. PIQUET Renault 1m27.828s

20. BUEMI Toro Rosso 1m28.076s

Source: itv-f1

hmm..williams is looking good. in fact, all three cheater teams looking good
lol, hopefully they all come out clean..we dont need another controversy...its nice to see small teams doing well.

lol

Ross Brawn on Thursday reacted to Ferrari's stance.

"Ferrari have only woken up because someone has driven faster than them," Brawn is quoted as saying by the Mirror.

He added: "The accusations are coming from teams who did not come up with the idea and now they are getting angry.

"For anyone who has read the rules it was quite obvious," said Brawn.

I was a bit shocked to see Rosberg doing so well,

yes its nice to see small teams doing well
it was trulli a good practice

brawn gp continue their excellent form coming in 1-2 in qualifying

1 Jenson Button ( Brawn-Mercedes )
2 Rubens Barrichello ( Brawn-Mercedes )
3 Sebastian Vettel ( RBR-Renault )
4 Robert Kubica ( BMW Sauber )
5 Nico Rosberg ( Williams-Toyota )
6 Timo Glock ( Toyota )
7 Felipe Massa ( Ferrari )
8 Jarno Trulli ( Toyota )
9 Kimi Räikkönen ( Ferrari )
10 Mark Webber ( RBR-Renault )
11 Nick Heidfeld ( BMW Sauber )
12 Fernando Alonso ( Renault )
13 Kazuki Nakajima ( Williams-Toyota )
14 Heikki Kovalainen ( McLaren-Mercedes )
15 Lewis Hamilton ( McLaren-Mercedes )
16 Sebastien Buemi ( STR-Ferrari )
17 Nelsinho Piquet ( Renault )
18 Giancarlo Fisichella ( Force India-Mercedes )
19 Adrian Sutil ( Force India-Mercedes )
20 Sebastien Bourdais ( STR-Ferrari )

As expected, Brawn F1 has taken 1-2 with Button on pole. Rosberg's stellar practice session form was missing in qualifying with him taking 5th.

Channel not coming, so i had to settle with live timings. Mclaren are down in 14th and 15th rounding up a disastrous start to the year for them