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After finishing fifth and sixth on the Friday timesheets, Lotus are being tipped by many as potential pole position and race winners in Barcelona this weekend. The black and gold cars are believed to have again carried heavy fuel loads on Friday.
The car looks to be working very well and we're happy with progress. There were no problems from either car and both drivers were pretty happy.
The home crowd had something to smile about in the morning session with local hero Fernando Alonso setting the early pace in Spain. But in the afternoon Alonso slipped down to 14th in the order and the power had seemingly shifted to McLaren's Jenson Button and Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel, who were separated by over a tenth in first and second. The drivers and senior team personnel report back on the opening day in Spain
Overall we had a good Friday. What we can see from measurements the new aero package, which was introduced in Mugello, works as expected.
May is a huge month for motorsport, with both the Monaco Grand Prix and Indianapolis 500 coming up in a fortnight. Having already competed in the former on twelve occasions, Jean Alesi now prepares for his debut on the legendary oval.
Jenson Button emerged at the top of the timesheets after an hour of the second practice session here at the Circuit de Catalunya on Friday, and stayed there for the remaining 30 minutes as everyone switched to their long runs. The 2009 world champion lapped his McLaren in 1m 23.399s, just 0.164s ahead of Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull on 1m 23.563s. Nico Rosberg was within three-tenths for Mercedes, on 1m 23.771s, with Lewis Hamilton half a second shy of his McLaren team mate on 1m 23.909s with the Lotuses of Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean right behind on 1m 23.918s and 1m 23.964s respectively.
Full times from today's second free practice session for the 2012 Gran Premio de Espana Santander.
After Fernando Alonso topped the timesheets for the opening Spanish Grand Prix practice session, Jenson Button and McLaren have moved ahead on Friday afternoon. On a pleasantly warm day in Montmeló, the 2009 winner set the pace as Lotus showed encouraging speed with suspected heavy fuel loads.
Jenson Button tops the timesheets in second session at Barcelona, however, it is Red Bull and Lotus that impress.
