Nico Rosberg gave the rebranded Mercedes GP a boost ahead of the start of the Brackley squad’s title defence this weekend by topping the afternoon practice times on the opening day of the 2010 season in Bahrain.
The young German has been overshadowed in the build-up to the campaign by the return of illustrious team-mate Michael Schumacher to Formula 1 – but appeared to show on Friday he has no intention of playing second fiddle to the legend by outpacing the 41-year-old in both sessions.
Rosberg’s afternoon best of 1m55.409s put him over four tenths ahead of McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton at the top of the charts, in a session that was largely characterised by long heavy-fuel runs on the softer tyres.
Schumacher moved up seven places from his morning position to end his first day back in competitive action a promising third, Mercedes appearing to have resolved some of the German's early set-up complaints as he lapped the lengthened track in 1m55.903s.
World champion Jenson Button made it a lock-out at the front for Mercedes-powered cars as he rounded off a very solid first day for McLaren in fourth.
Red Bull joined its fellow title contenders at the front thanks to Sebastian Vettel – albeit some 0.4s adrift of Button – in fifth, but the gremlins that struck its RB6 during pre-season reoccurred as a driveshaft problem sidelined Mark Webber after just 12 laps.
Ferrari seemed to focus on longer runs more than most, indeed Felipe Massa spent most of the session lapping around the 2m mark before a late flyer propelled him past new team-mate Fernando Alonso and into seventh.
Meanwhile, rookies Nico Hulkenberg and Vitaly Petrov both impressed to take sixth and eighth for Williams and Renault respectively.
Judging by the opening day at Sakhir, the ban on mid-race refuelling for this year has led to a change in emphasise for teams on a Friday – with long runs on heavier tanks of fuel the order of the day rather than shorter stints which lead to more order changes.
Indeed after Button, Hulkenberg and Hamilton had set the ball rolling for fastest times in the opening 12 minutes, Rosberg was never surpassed once he moved to the top for the first time with just 17 minutes of the 90 of the clock.
The former Williams man’s initial 1m55.555s on the soft tyres took half a second out of Hamilton’s then best, before he returned on the super-soft rubber just after the one-third mark to lap 0.146s quicker still.
But, while the significant positions on the timesheet became rather static thereafter, the session was not short on incident and talking points, particularly surrounding the three new teams.
The gap between the fastest car and the best of the newcomers closed from seven to five and a half seconds in the afternoon, with Lotus’s experienced duo of Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli completing 23 and 14 laps respectively to slot the team ahead of rival Virgin.
Having not completed a timed lap in the earlier session, Hispania finally got its first ever timed lap on the board after 33 minutes of the second session – Bruno Senna initially lapping a whopping 15 seconds off the pace in the untested HRT-Cosworth before cutting the deficit to 11 over the course of his 17 laps.
The Brazilian’s final tour back to the pit lane once the chequered flag had fallen ended abruptly though when the wheel nut on his car’s right-rear tyre worked loose and sent him slithering to an eventual halt in the run-off area at the first corner.
Team-mate Karun Chandhok is still waiting to sample the HRT, however, as the team was unable to resolve clutch and gearbox issues with his car meaning he was forced to sit out of the whole day.
F1’s more established squads were also experiencing their own reliability headaches – no more so than at Toro Rosso where an unspecified technical problem with the rear of Sebastien Buemi’s car meant the Swiss also had to watch the afternoon’s action from the sidelines.
STR was lucky to not have a bigger problem on its hands however when Jaime Alguersuari only narrowly avoided a collision with the barriers after spinning his STR5 at the tricky left-handed turn six after running wide over the kerb.
Sauber's C29 also appeared to be struggling through the twisty middle sector of the lap, although its two drivers still wound up 10th and 11th respectively.
The Hinwil-based squad looks set to be in the thick of a tight scrap for the points positions behind the 'big four' this weekend, with Force India (which finished second practice 12th and 14th), Williams and Renault all appearing evenly matched so far.
Bahrain Grand Prix free practice session 2 times
1 ROSBERG Mercedes 1m55.409s
2 HAMILTON McLaren 1m55.854s
3 SCHUMACHER Mercedes 1m55.903s
4 BUTTON McLaren 1m56.076s
5 VETTEL Red Bull 1m56.459s
6 HULKENBERG Williams 1m56.501s
7 MASSA Ferrari 1m56.555s
8 PETROV Renault 1m56.750s
9 ALONSO Ferrari 1m57.140s
10 DE LA ROSA Sauber 1m57.255s
11 KOBAYASHI Sauber 1m57.352s
12 SUTIL Force India 1m57.361s
13 BARRICHELLO Williams 1m57.452s
14 LIUZZI Force India 1m57.833s
15 KUBICA Renault 1m58.155s
16 ALGUERSUARI Toro Rosso 1m59.799s
17 WEBBER Red Bull 2m00.444s
18 KOVALAINEN Lotus 2m00.873s
19 TRULLI Lotus 2m00.990s
20 GLOCK Virgin 2m02.037s
21 DI GRASSI Virgin 2m02.188s
22 SENNA HRT 2m06.968s
23 BUEMI Toro Rosso no time
24 CHANDHOK HRT no time
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