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The 2nd Friday Practice session for Round 3 of the 2008 F1 season at Bahrain.
Transcript
00:00:00Right now, boys, right now, victory for the first car that is to win.
00:00:07Come on, mate, he's ruining our race, let's get past him.
00:00:14Hey, touch this, smoke coming off the top.
00:00:21Well, if you're a fan of Formula 1, you have to admit it's been an interesting two weeks
00:00:28since round two of the 2008 season in Malaysia.
00:00:31We're about to kick off the weekend of round three.
00:00:34Welcome to Speed's exclusive live coverage of Friday's second 90-minute practice for
00:00:39the Grand Prix of Bahrain.
00:00:41Hello again, everyone, I'm Bob Varsha with David Hobbs, Steve Matchett, Peter Windsor
00:00:45will be along shortly.
00:00:47As always, there was one 90-minute, fairly uneventful session this morning here at Bahrain
00:00:52International Circuit.
00:00:54So let's check out some of the highlights.
00:00:59World Championship leader Lewis Hamilton climbed aboard fairly quickly.
00:01:04Only two teams went through a winner test here at Bahrain.
00:01:07There's Fernando Alonso, two-time winner at this track.
00:01:10Then Hamilton goes out early on, sets up the fastest lap at that point in the session.
00:01:15He ended up fourth in the session overall.
00:01:18Alonso here, a little bit of a struggle down the old hairpin there, cranking on the wheel,
00:01:22not looking very exciting, but finished up well down the field on tenth.
00:01:26Last year's race winner, Massa, P1 in his session of the F2008, Kimi Räikkönen, his
00:01:31teammate this year, second in the session.
00:01:35One of the problems that drivers will have to contend with at Bahrain is dust, and there's
00:01:39a lot of it as the sand blows over the track.
00:01:41Here you see Kimi getting the chassis out of shape, and just look at the dust as soon
00:01:46as you run off track.
00:01:50Nico Rosberg having a good run into Williams after a very lacklustre run in Sepang a couple
00:01:54of weeks ago, split the Ferraris and the McLarens, and then these two Toro Rosso teammates, Vettel
00:01:59warming up his tyres and Sebastian Bordet, nearly come together.
00:02:05At session's end, Felipe Massa, under extraordinary pressure from the Italian press, following
00:02:10a horrible start to the season, finishes quickest in the session.
00:02:18Towards the bottom of your screen, you'll see the morning times.
00:02:23Ferraris leading Nico Rosberg's Williams as we come back to live pictures and begin this
00:02:28second 90-minute practice.
00:02:31Warno Trulli on track in the Toyota.
00:02:34Trulli was asked by journalists in the Thursday press conference here in Bahrain why he took
00:02:40so long to get out of the car after his fourth place finish in Malaysia two weeks ago.
00:02:44There was some concern about whether the Italian's health was everything it should
00:02:48be.
00:02:49He said, no, that's pretty typical for me.
00:02:50I wasn't on the podium, so I saw no reason to get out of the car.
00:02:54Apparently, he spent quite a while there.
00:02:59Here's Timo Glock lighting up all four corners and deciding discretion was the better part
00:03:07of valour.
00:03:09Former GP2 champion trying to come to grips, literally, with this Bahrain circuit, which
00:03:15is traditionally incredibly dusty when the teams get here, so nobody is anxious to go
00:03:20out and try to press the envelope in terms of performance.
00:03:24It is just so slick.
00:03:25Yeah, it's one of those green tracks that picks up speed as the weekend goes on, as
00:03:28they put more racing rubber down on line.
00:03:31It picks up speed, especially where he went off there, going down to that infield hairpin.
00:03:38And Trulli sets the early time to beat.
00:03:42Trulli has been very upbeat about improvements to the Toyota and the change in atmosphere
00:03:48in his team now that Ralph Schumacher has departed.
00:03:51Trulli says, I've spoken with my new teammate, Timo Glock, more in the first three weeks
00:03:55of the season than I spoke with Ralph in three years.
00:03:58I have to believe that.
00:04:02This is Sebastian Bourdais, who had a pretty sound start to his Grand Prix career in Australia,
00:04:07and then it all kind of came apart in Malaysia the following week.
00:04:11Well, if you've called that up on the first lap coming apart, you're absolutely right.
00:04:15I'd say that's an awkward start to the day.
00:04:16Yeah.
00:04:17Well, at least you saved the mileage on your engine.
00:04:23Anthony Davidson having a pretty brutal time of it.
00:04:27Not sure if he was going to get the second Super Guri Honda seat.
00:04:31Team is short on parts, desperate to get back to home base in Europe, beginning with round
00:04:36four two weeks from now.
00:04:37As we watch the young Englishman make his way around, let's welcome the fourth member
00:04:41of our team, Peter Windsor.
00:04:45Thanks very much, Bob.
00:04:46Well, as ever, great to be here in the paddock, especially here in Bahrain.
00:04:50What a fantastic circuit.
00:04:51Lots of blind brows, fast, slow corners.
00:04:54Pretty easy.
00:04:55No, that's not the right word.
00:04:56Not as difficult to overtake here as perhaps on some other circuits, as we saw last year.
00:05:00Jarno Trulli particularly passing, I think, four cars in the race last year.
00:05:04So a fantastic circuit to be coming for race three, race one to McLaren, race two to Ferrari.
00:05:10You know, it's a bit of a sequence building up.
00:05:11It's just going to be fantastic here on Sunday, I think.
00:05:14I agree.
00:05:15It should be warm in Bahrain, and we expect a big crowd on hand.
00:05:25As you can see in this Herman Tilke design circuit, very, very wide, lots of room to
00:05:30go.
00:05:31The runoff areas are all paved, but right down here at turn one, as we saw when Kimi
00:05:35Raikkonen went off this morning, if you go offline here, still all that desert is assembled
00:05:41right close to the track.
00:05:42And of course, it blows across the track, the wind blows, blows the sand onto the track,
00:05:46so the corners are different every lap, which is a bit off-putting, certainly to start with,
00:05:50until they really blow most of the sand off.
00:05:53Speaking of off-putting, you have to wonder what's going through that man's mind, Mark
00:05:56Webber and David Coulthard, and for that matter, the Scuderia Toro Rosso drivers.
00:06:00They've seen a brake disc explode, one per team, in Australia and Malaysia, and here
00:06:06we come to the circuit that is second only to the side of the Canadian Grand Prix in
00:06:12Montreal in terms of demands on the braking system.
00:06:16Those guys have to be wondering whether the brakes are going to hold up this weekend.
00:06:19Yeah, you're right, Bob, it is.
00:06:21It is a heavy braking track around here, right there being one of them into turn one, and
00:06:27then this horrible little turn two, left-hand sweeper, they couldn't have done without that, really.
00:06:31And then you get the... let's change pictures now, we're looking at Seb Vettel, I think.
00:06:41Peter Windsor has some thoughts on braking as well. Peter?
00:06:44Well, Bob, yes, I was having lunch with the very relaxed Mark Webber, who's exactly saying
00:06:50what Steve was just saying, very, very tough on brakes here, and at Red Bull particularly,
00:06:54he was saying they had a lot of trouble getting their brake balance right, and also the characteristic
00:06:58of that morning's session was how much everybody was eating into their rear tyres.
00:07:03Suspect as the track picks up grip, that will go away, but at the moment, everybody very
00:07:06wary about rear tyre wear, and brake balance, as Steve said, is one of the big issues.
00:07:11Peter, we know that Bridgestone has brought the two middle compounds, that's a change
00:07:17from what they had here last year, can you expand a little bit on that wear issue?
00:07:23Well, I think it's more a function of what we've seen in the first two races, to be honest,
00:07:28and I think Bridgestone at the moment, trying to get on top of a graining issue we've seen
00:07:32from the start of this year, it is something that goes away in two or three laps, but they
00:07:36are at the moment, I wouldn't say playing around with compounds, but they did test here,
00:07:41so one's got to assume that they're pretty confident that these compounds are going to
00:07:45be OK on race day, and that graining will be less than we've seen in Malaysia and Australia,
00:07:51but graining was the talking point in those two races to some extent, and that's what
00:07:56the main focus is this weekend.
00:07:59You can see that the guys at Force India, when you have a good shot at the front of
00:08:03the car here, look at the front brake ducts on the Force India chassis, you'll see they're
00:08:07much bigger than a lot of other teams have been running, you have to look right close
00:08:12into the corners here, but big scoops onto the car, and as we've been saying in previous
00:08:16races, the aerodynamicists hate that because it causes so much drag across the front of
00:08:21the car, because they sit right behind the wing elements of the front wing, you can see
00:08:27them there sitting proud, and they cause a lot of drag and a lot of turbulence around
00:08:31the car, the aerodynamicists hate it, but you need them round here, because as Peter
00:08:35was just expanding on you too, Bob, it is such heavy demands on brakes, it's three relatively
00:08:41long straights around the Bahrain track, where you stamp on the brakes right at the
00:08:46end of the track, right at the end of the straight, which puts a lot of load on, and
00:08:50then compounded with that, around the middle section, there's a lot of on-off, on-off frequency
00:08:55braking which doesn't allow the brakes to cool, so it's really the worst of both worlds,
00:08:59you need to cool the brakes, they don't cool, and then you put a lot of demand on the brakes
00:09:04three times, and that puts a huge amount of wear onto the disc.
00:09:07It's hard to believe it's been five years, come race day on Sunday, since Giancarlo Fisichella
00:09:13won for this team, when it was known as Jordan, in the 2003 Brazilian Grand Prix.
00:09:18That was a bit of a fluky win, at the time, that rear tyre wear, of course, is something
00:09:23that the teams are finding this year, with the loss of traction control, these cars obviously
00:09:29much more twitchy at the rear end, and tend to spin the wheels, so that's another thing
00:09:34they've got to come used to.
00:09:35Heidfeld has a great name for traction control, calls it engine push, there's a bit of a slide
00:09:40from the world champ, we'll be back.
00:09:45Come back to Bahrain, more hijinks from the two-time world champion, and two-time winner
00:09:50of this race, Fernando Alonso, just struggling with that Renault.
00:09:54He's having a lot of trouble with that infield hairpin there, that very tight left-hand hairpin
00:09:58he did this morning, and it's a difficult one to approach, you're approaching it around
00:10:03a corner.
00:10:04Let's listen.
00:10:05Well, the track feels like it's in terrible shape, no grip whatsoever, just sliding around
00:10:17like crazy.
00:10:18I kept on making mistakes, because I kept on overshooting Turn 10, for example, so talk
00:10:28about balance is a bit difficult.
00:10:34He has never driven this racetrack before, has Sebastian Bourdain.
00:10:37Speaking of tracks, let's take a look at our BMW track analysis, and give us your thoughts,
00:10:41David.
00:10:42Well, it hasn't really got much elevation change, but it does have some, it sort of
00:10:45rolls around, so you turn one there, you brake from about 300 kilometers an hour, down into
00:10:50first gear, then accelerate up through that little Turn 2, that left-right kink.
00:10:54Turn 3, there's a bit of overtaking goes on down there, it's not quite as sharp as that
00:10:58when in real life.
00:10:59Then down through that little S-pen there, which is high-speed, Turn 5, a sharp right-hander.
00:11:05And that Turn 8 to Turn 7, that's where Alonso is having trouble, because as you approach
00:11:09Turn 7 there, through 6, the car's all unloaded, you've got all the weight onto the right-hand
00:11:14side of the car, so it locks up the left front all the time.
00:11:17Turn 8, pretty good corner through there, then Turn 9's a lovely fast right-hander,
00:11:22going up through a crest of a hill, as blind as you go into Turn 10, which, of course,
00:11:26you want to get Turn 10 right, because it leads onto that long, long, long back straight,
00:11:31down to Turn 11, which is a pretty quick corner, but of course, again, you want to make a good
00:11:35exit out of there, because the real best opportunity for overtaking here is into Turn 1.
00:11:41But as Sebastien Bordet was saying there on that radio, the track is covered in dust,
00:11:46there's no grip anywhere, so it's very hard to get a balance in the car, because both
00:11:49ends are sliding, it's difficult to get it set up, and it'll take them all day today
00:11:52to blow that dust off, and then, of course, a bit of a breeze tonight will put it all back.
00:11:56It will, and it is, you know, as Sebastien was saying, it's difficult to get an idea
00:12:00of balance at the moment, because there's so much dust blowing around, but it is difficult
00:12:03to set the car up here.
00:12:05Two very different parts of the track, that infield section, we were talking about the
00:12:09braking, those three relatively long straights, and then that infield section, completely
00:12:14different layout to the track, where you need good mechanical grip, and you need the car
00:12:18to be compliant enough to work round there, and then you want the car set up as stiff
00:12:22as possible, within reason, to get a good straight line speed and braking balance as
00:12:26you go down into turn one.
00:12:28We're following David Coulthard, the highest ranked man in the championship, who has yet
00:12:32to score a point this season.
00:12:33Now the camera switch to the onboard of Felipe Massa's Ferrari.
00:12:37Apparently no engine change in that Ferrari, despite the fact that he spun out of the race
00:12:41two weeks ago in Malaysia, and could change engines without penalty, but they don't have
00:12:45much mileage on it, and I'm sure they want to stay on that two-race engine cycle in order
00:12:50to have a fresh one when they go to Spain for the opening round of the European portion
00:12:55of the season in a couple of weeks.
00:12:57Right now the order is Nick Heidfeld, Jarno Trulli, David Coulthard, Sebastian Bordet,
00:13:01Giancarlo Fisichella's fifth, then Nico Rosberg, Heikki Kovalainen, Fernando Alonso, Robert
00:13:06Kubica, and the BMW Sauber, and Mark Webber, and talking about times, Heidfeld's session
00:13:12best right now, 134.324, the fastest lap recorded around here that we're aware of.
00:13:19Mark Webber has gone around in 129, so that tells you how much grip is out there.
00:13:23Let's go to Peter Windsor.
00:13:25Bob, very different mirror location on the two red bulls now.
00:13:29That was affected for the race in Malaysia, and it's a result, really, of the drivers
00:13:34not really being able to see where they are in traffic from the original position that
00:13:37Adrian Newey had them for the start of the year.
00:13:39Now Adrian, of course, did that for aerodynamic reasons.
00:13:42They were extended much further out, and he reckoned it was worth about a tenth of a second
00:13:46in the wind tunnel, more or less in the position Ferrari had them in the Michael Schumacher
00:13:49era.
00:13:50Both drivers, however, over the winter said they felt it was pretty difficult in testing
00:13:55even to feel where the car was relative to other traffic on the road, and so it proved,
00:14:00of course, in Australia.
00:14:01David Coulthard saying that really one of the reasons he had that accident with Massa
00:14:04was because he couldn't really get a very good feel for where he was on the track because
00:14:07of the location of the mirrors, and so we see the mirrors much closer to the cockpit
00:14:12now.
00:14:13But it does bring into question the regulation because the reality is that car was passed
00:14:18legal obviously for the start of the season, and the mirror test is obviously not tight
00:14:23enough because the drivers must be confident.
00:14:25I don't believe safety should be compromised for aerodynamics, and this was a very good
00:14:30example of that.
00:14:31And the story goes that a few years ago, Adrian Newey actually had very, very small mirrors
00:14:35on a Williams at one point, and to pass the test, he had an engineer stand in front of
00:14:40the car on a radio link to the driver, and the FIA official behind the car who was moving
00:14:44around, and Adrian was just telling the driver what to say whenever the engineer and the
00:14:49FIA guy asked him where he was.
00:14:50Yeah, I can see him.
00:14:51Yeah, I can see him.
00:14:52You know, you can't blame it.
00:14:53Yeah, you can't blame Adrian for pushing it as hard as he can, but I think in this case
00:14:57it's good to see the Red Bull with more sensible mirrors now.
00:14:59Absolutely.
00:15:00Action heating up right now.
00:15:02Kimi Räikkönen, as you saw, went to P1, first man in the 1 minute 33 second zone.
00:15:07Lewis Hamilton completing his first hot lap.
00:15:11See where he goes.
00:15:12Well, his first sector was the quickest of this session so far.
00:15:21And look at his progress with that G-meter, up to 5 G's on this track, some very high
00:15:25speed corners as well as some very, very slow ones.
00:15:28Well in control here, nearly 8 tenths up on that first sector.
00:15:32Now this, this is that long one, those long straights that Steve was talking about, slightly
00:15:35downhill, coming into turn 11, the last corner, down a couple of gears, but it's so easy to
00:15:41overdo that corner because the road's dropping away, it's difficult to get a real good sightline
00:15:46and there's so much run-off area, it's tempting to overdo it there.
00:15:49He won by .239 seconds and it looks like Räikkönen is starting another flyer.
00:15:54He just went purple quickest of all in the third sector, beginning another hot lap.
00:15:59Now you see again how easy it is to lock up, get out of shape at the end of the straight.
00:16:03And thinking back, remember we were talking about those big brake ducts on the chassis,
00:16:06certainly we saw that on the Force India chassis, when you go down these long straights with
00:16:10those big brake ducts, of course you cool the brakes, overcool them, they start to drop
00:16:14in temperature and they need to be kept at a constant temperature, a core temperature
00:16:17of about between 4 and 600 degrees C, and then they overcool at the end of the straight
00:16:22when you need them, and again, when you get in the middle section of the track, they don't
00:16:27have time to cool down enough, it's really, you know, you're really caught between a rock
00:16:31and a hard place, trying to control the brake wear on the car.
00:16:37Rubens Marichello told the press in the intervening two weeks since Malaysia that he thinks he
00:16:42can go at least 300 race starts in his Grand Prix career before he'll consider retiring.
00:16:48I suppose there's some question whether he'll be a contracted driver that long, but that
00:16:53is some career for the Brazilian.
00:16:56We'll take a break and return to practice in Bahrain.
00:17:00Coming up on 63 Minutes remaining in the second 90-minute Friday practice, opening day of
00:17:06the Grand Prix of Bahrain, round three of the 2008 Formula One season.
00:17:10You'll see it live here on Speed.
00:17:12With David Hobbs, Steve Matchett, and Peter Windsor, I'm Bob Varsha.
00:17:15This is Heikki Kovalainen, who it must be said is doing a pretty stout job as a guy
00:17:20who, whether he likes it or not, pretty much came into the McLaren Mercedes team as number
00:17:24two to Lewis Hamilton.
00:17:26But at this point, he's running very strongly in the top three or four in the world championship.
00:17:31And at the last round of Malaysia, not only outqualified Hamilton, but outran him with
00:17:36the help of a bulky pit stop for the Brit.
00:17:39Yeah, there's no doubt about it.
00:17:40Hamilton would have been on the podium and not Kovalainen, but nevertheless, Kovalainen
00:17:43was on the podium and he's now a hot foot in pursuit of Hamilton.
00:17:47Now he lost it in that second sector.
00:17:49The first sector he was quicker, but off the pace, but still Heikki Kovalainen looking
00:17:54very, very good.
00:17:55He had a great race last year in Japan in that rain.
00:17:58A fantastic race to come second to Hamilton.
00:18:01Peter?
00:18:03Well, David, yes, he did have a fantastic race.
00:18:05But one thought, I don't know what you guys felt about this, but when we actually looked
00:18:09at the amount of fuel that the two Ferrari drivers are running, particularly Massa versus
00:18:14the fuel of the two McLaren drivers, I think the reality is if McLaren had run Massa fuel
00:18:20in qualifying, they would have had at least one car on the front row.
00:18:23So maybe the difference between McLaren and Ferrari wasn't as big as we thought at the
00:18:28time in Malaysia.
00:18:29And retrospectively, McLaren were pretty much on the pace.
00:18:32But then, of course, their races were ruined by that by that penalty.
00:18:35Well, absolutely.
00:18:36I mean, they got shafted again.
00:18:37They're put back in the field, qualified on the second row and got put back to the fifth
00:18:43and sixth row.
00:18:44And Hamilton had that terrible pit stop, which cost him 20 seconds, which really effectively
00:18:48put him out of the picture.
00:18:49So.
00:18:50And of course, he got stuck behind Mark Webber twice, which is not a good guy to get stuck
00:18:54behind.
00:18:55I got to disagree with you on that getting shafted part, David.
00:18:57I think the video showed that those drivers were cooling down on the racing line when
00:19:01that man, Nick Heidfeld and Fernando Alonso, were still on a hot lap.
00:19:06But the rules, you know, it's hard to be you can't be offline.
00:19:09The problem is, as Peter Winsor said last week, the trouble is, if anybody's going 30
00:19:14mile an hour and you're doing 190, it doesn't matter whether online or offline.
00:19:17They're definitely going to be very off putting.
00:19:19In fact, the two Ferraris were wandering around way offline as well at the same speed at the
00:19:24same time.
00:19:25There was talk of a new rule coming down that after your hot laps, you have to complete
00:19:28your cool down within 120 percent of your hot lap time.
00:19:31I don't know if anything formal has been announced.
00:19:34Let's go to Peter Winsor.
00:19:35Well, yes, my understanding is that rule will be enforced here in Bahrain.
00:19:40Of course, anything can happen in Formula One these days.
00:19:42So I guess we better wait till tomorrow.
00:19:43But my understanding is that it will be in force, although, of course, we shouldn't rely
00:19:48on the world champion for this sort of information, because yesterday we were chatting to him
00:19:52before the whole weekend began, of course.
00:19:54And he said, Kimi, what do you think about the new revised Q3?
00:19:57And he said, and I quote, I think so that I don't know what you're talking about.
00:20:02They changed Q3.
00:20:03Why?
00:20:04Why did they change?
00:20:06There you see it in replay.
00:20:07But other than that, it was on top of it all.
00:20:10Yeah, exactly.
00:20:11That's right.
00:20:12In fact, after Nick Heidfeld went by, he didn't see the exchange.
00:20:16But Lewis Hamilton dove to the other side of the track before Fernando Alonso came through.
00:20:20And Peter Winsor asked Heikki Kovalainen about it afterward.
00:20:23He said, yeah, I was in the way.
00:20:24I didn't mean to.
00:20:25Nobody told me they were coming.
00:20:26But that's the trouble.
00:20:27I can do about it now.
00:20:28When you're going 30 miles an hour and they're all doing 180, you're going to be in the way
00:20:32wherever you are, because it's very off-putting for the guy who's doing 180 when there's a car in front.
00:20:38Personally, I think the solution would be just to take the fuel out of the car in qualifying.
00:20:44Let's have a look at cars qualifying on low fuel right up until pole position is set,
00:20:48then put the fuel in, then race the car.
00:20:50So we can see real pole-setting qualifying times.
00:20:53I think the idea of setting pole position on a time that is slower than that in Q2 confuses viewers.
00:21:03And I don't like it.
00:21:05I don't like it.
00:21:06How can you have the fastest times of qualifying set in Q2 and then the top 10 are all, you know,
00:21:11slower times than that because they've got fuel on?
00:21:13I just don't think we need that rule any longer.
00:21:15How about Patrick Head's idea?
00:21:17Let's qualify on low fuel and then invert the grid.
00:21:21Well, you know, that sounds a bit bizarre, but I understand what he's saying.
00:21:26I can remember having a conversation with Dave Despain on Winton all about this.
00:21:29If we're trying to get cars to overtake and people sometimes complain,
00:21:33you don't see an awful lot of overtaking in Formula 1.
00:21:35If you set the grid up with the fastest cars at the front and the slowest cars at the back,
00:21:39it's not rocket science that there's very little overtaking.
00:21:43You know, it kind of is a no-brainer, as you'd say in America, right?
00:21:48Yeah.
00:21:50There's Fernando Alonso.
00:21:52They posted the times on screen a moment ago, but let's run them down once again.
00:21:56As soon as Hamilton Alonso finds his place.
00:22:00Well, we'll wait for the other side of the break to do it.
00:22:02There's your top four.
00:22:03Maybe we'll show you four more and see you in a moment.
00:22:06♪♪
00:22:08BC car.
00:22:10♪♪
00:22:18Welcome back.
00:22:2055 minutes and change remaining in the second 90-minute Friday practice.
00:22:23Bahrain International Circuit in preparation for Sunday's Bahrain Formula 1 Grand Prix.
00:22:28Live exclusively here on Speed.
00:22:31Hobbs, Matchett, and Windsor.
00:22:32I'm Varsha.
00:22:33You're watching Felipe Massa.
00:22:36Currently shown well down the order in 13th.
00:22:40He'll probably adjust that right now to right about P1, I'd say.
00:22:45Oh, I'm sorry.
00:22:46Just over 10th quicker than Luis Hamilton.
00:22:49Oh, meanwhile, back at the sandbox, Anthony Davidson.
00:22:56Losing the struggle for grip in his Super Aguri Honda.
00:22:59Here's what it looked like from his perspective.
00:23:03Ooh, ooh, ooh.
00:23:04Like riding a cheese grater.
00:23:07And, of course, once you're off onto that hard, the asphalt runoff area,
00:23:12of course, it's got so much sand on it.
00:23:14Now it's all stuck to those hot tires.
00:23:16So it'll take him a couple laps to get those off again.
00:23:18One of the things the drivers say about this track, as you watch Jenson Button,
00:23:22first time we've seen him, it's very hard to find your way around this track.
00:23:26Very flat and featureless.
00:23:27No buildings, trees, things like that to use as visual references.
00:23:32You've got the brake markers going into the corners, and that's about it.
00:23:36Jenson Button struggles around and gets it up to eighth.
00:23:40But the Honda is very slow on the straights everywhere,
00:23:43and I'm assuming it'll be the same here this weekend, unless they've done something.
00:23:47They've got to get their aero package altered so they've got some more straight line speed
00:23:52with some decent downforce.
00:23:53At the moment, they're right out to lunch.
00:23:56Robert Kubic is currently in seventh spot.
00:24:00Behind, pick up a couple of spots here.
00:24:06Everybody running the soft tires, of course.
00:24:08This day, he's trying to get some rubber down, trying to get some grip out of the car.
00:24:12You know, it's Davidson limping back to the pit.
00:24:18This is turn eight and nine.
00:24:20Very nice, rising left-handed there, then sweeps right, still rising.
00:24:25Gets to the top of the hill right at the top on the braking point for turn ten.
00:24:30Again, you've got to come off here well.
00:24:31Good long run down to a slightly downhill all the way down here.
00:24:37To this turn eleven.
00:24:38And here's a place, Bob, where you're talking.
00:24:40There's nothing for the driver to see.
00:24:41Look at that in front.
00:24:42Just great, vast, expansive, open sort of desert and asphalt.
00:24:45Very hard to get a real turning spot for that corner.
00:24:50Fourteen, six seconds roughly off the pace.
00:24:53Massa, Hamilton, Bourdais, the top three.
00:24:55Good job by the Frenchman in his first visit.
00:24:57Very good.
00:24:58Then Raikkonen, Kovalainen, Coulthard, Kubica, the man you ride with, Jensen Button, Nick Heidfeld and Timo Glock.
00:25:06Timo Glock and his teammate Jarno Trulli there in tenth and eleventh.
00:25:09So the Toyotas again showing a little bit more form this year than have done before.
00:25:13Then Barrichello, Mark Webber.
00:25:15There's Lewis looking at his Game Boy, I expect.
00:25:19Like all the drivers in the Friday press conference,
00:25:21Lewis Hamilton refused to be drawn on the situation involving FIA president Max Mosley.
00:25:26If you're a follower of the sport, or even if you're not,
00:25:28you may be aware that the FIA president has refused to deny that he is the individual
00:25:34pictured in a grainy video that hit the Internet,
00:25:37courtesy of the British tabloid News of the World,
00:25:40showing him allegedly cavorting with five ladies of the night in a London flat,
00:25:45allegedly also involving some S&M and some Nazi overtones.
00:25:52The whole thing has become a huge international issue.
00:25:55Several of the manufacturers in Formula One have voiced their displeasure with Max publicly.
00:26:00He has retaliated, both in the press and via letters on FIA's website.
00:26:06He has retaliated, both in the press and via letters on FIA's website.
00:26:12Which is a bit unusual, considering that he insists the entire thing is a private matter.
00:26:16It'll all play out in the courts, it would appear at this point.
00:26:20Moments ago, our Peter Windsor caught up with three-time world champion Sir Jackie Stewart,
00:26:25who's had his share of run-ins with the FIA president.
00:26:29Sir Jackie, you probably don't want me to ask this question, but I'd like to ask it nonetheless.
00:26:34Your reaction to the News of the World article on Max Mosley,
00:26:38and the repercussions that possibly flow from that article?
00:26:42Well, I was very sad that it had occurred at all,
00:26:45and it was obviously brought to public scrutiny in the fashion that it was.
00:26:52I don't think it's good for motorsport, Formula One, motor industry,
00:26:56or even the motor clubs that are under the authority of the FIA,
00:27:01because their president is the one who's being illustrated as the focus of these articles.
00:27:10So I'm very sad about it. Disappointed and sad.
00:27:14In the big wide world of real politics, if that's the right word,
00:27:18quite often the opposition and indeed the public are out there calling for resignations
00:27:22or some sort of response when incidents like this occur.
00:27:25What do you think is the appropriate action now?
00:27:29I think it's probably untenable for Max Mosley to remain as president of the FIA,
00:27:35because he is president of a global authority.
00:27:39And that global authority reaches out to different continents, different countries,
00:27:45with different cultures, different religions, different moral standards.
00:27:51And I think if he had been the head of the CBI, or the head of the United Nations,
00:27:59or the head of the Olympic movement, or tennis, golf, or football,
00:28:05I think already he would have had to resign.
00:28:09And I think, I mean, it took the governor of New York one week to come to a decision
00:28:20in respect to his future as a politician.
00:28:24So, you know, they're still perhaps early days.
00:28:27Sir Jackie, thank you very much indeed.
00:28:30Interesting comments from Jackie Stewart.
00:28:34It should be also pointed out, I suppose, that Max Mosley,
00:28:37in a letter to all the teams and the clubs and the media,
00:28:41said that he had received a number of expressions of support from within the industry.
00:28:47He has not made any of those names public.
00:28:51And in fact, it has emerged today in the media that the German national club, the ADAC,
00:28:56has called for Max Mosley's resignation.
00:28:59Well, I think that Jackie Stewart hit the nail right on the head there
00:29:03when he used the word untenable.
00:29:05I mean, it is an untenable situation for Mosley to be in at the moment,
00:29:08and there is no getting away from that.
00:29:10As he said, if he'd been United Nations, or the head of the Olympic movement,
00:29:13or head of the business industrial units in England.
00:29:16Exactly. Any major corporation.
00:29:18Any major corporation.
00:29:19And most minor ones.
00:29:21And I mean, reading my contract with Speed Channel,
00:29:24if I was to do something like that, I wouldn't be sitting here now.
00:29:29Well, we should point out in that connection that the British tabloid involved,
00:29:32News of the World and Speed, share common ownership.
00:29:35So, for what that's worth.
00:29:39For me, my personal take on this is,
00:29:42what happens behind closed doors to a large extent in somebody's private life is up to them.
00:29:48I mean, to get involved in somebody's private life,
00:29:51it was disgraceful what the video showed, but it is a guy's private life.
00:29:54However, for me, if there is any overtones of fascism or Nazism involved in that,
00:30:00and I must stress that at the moment, Mosley is going out of his way to deny that is the case.
00:30:05But, if it is proved that that is the case, to me it is absolutely clear the guy has to go.
00:30:12I just cannot see how a sport, which for me, and I know many other people involved in it,
00:30:18is designed and works in a way that unites countries, brings people together,
00:30:23unites families, and we all have a great time.
00:30:25If there is any way that that is associated with Nazism, fascism,
00:30:28which has destroyed families, destroyed countries, and made such a hash of Europe in the 1930s,
00:30:35that has to go. It absolutely cannot be a part of the sport.
00:30:39Peter, do you have a thought?
00:30:41Steve, well, it's very difficult to disagree with any of the thoughts of you gentlemen.
00:30:45The only thing I would add to Steve's comment is that I think in a lot of countries, Steve,
00:30:49people feel the same way, not only about that aspect of it, the Nazi-fascism side of it,
00:30:54but also, you know, from us to judge, but as Jackie Stewart said,
00:31:00we're talking a lot of different cultures and religions in terms of the FIA,
00:31:05and, you know, it doesn't just end with the fascism aspect.
00:31:10And with regard to other cultures and their point of view, Max Mosley, disingenuously as it turns out,
00:31:18said that he was not going to come to the race this weekend as originally planned because,
00:31:22quote, I want to work on my legal defense.
00:31:25Well, it turned out afterwards that the Crown Prince of Bahrain wrote to Max Mosley
00:31:30as soon as the story broke and said, essentially, you are not welcome here.
00:31:34And that is the kind of thing Sir Jackie Stewart, I think, is talking about.
00:31:38And of course, to be not welcome here when he's supposed to be the head of the governing body,
00:31:42which is looking after all these teams, McLaren, Ferrari, BMW.
00:31:46Obviously, it's, again, like Jackie says, it's untenable. It's got to be here.
00:31:52And you can put aside the whole business about my private life because, in this position,
00:31:57you have a role to play on the world stage, and that is a different standard of behavior.
00:32:02We'll be back.
00:32:05...on the camera mount on top of the chassis.
00:32:08Blame television. Peter Windsor.
00:32:11Thanks, Bob. Yes, we just saw Nico Rosberg do a pretty good lap there.
00:32:14A nice recovery for the AT&T-Williams-Toyota team from a horrendous weekend in Malaysia
00:32:19where they just went from the front to the back of the grid overnight.
00:32:23A great third place in Australia and then nowhere, no grip at all in Malaysia.
00:32:27Very, very strange. It's rare we see that happening in Formula 1.
00:32:30I was on the phone last week to Patrick Haird and said,
00:32:32Patrick, what was that all about? And he said, how much time have you got?
00:32:36And I said, well, sadly, I didn't have that much time, so we couldn't really go into it in detail.
00:32:40But I do, Steve, I wonder whether, if I could have your thoughts on this.
00:32:43It only occurred to me the other day that there are a lot of ex-Renault people now at Williams.
00:32:48There's Ed Wood, who's ex-Renault. There's John Tomkinson, who's ex-Renault.
00:32:51And, of course, there's Rod Nelson, who's ex-Renault.
00:32:53And we all know what the Renault philosophy was over the last four or five years.
00:32:56Get quite a lot of weight on the rear of the car.
00:32:59More relative weight than we see on most cars these days.
00:33:02Renault now actually moving the weight forward again with the 08 car.
00:33:05But the Williams, the word on the street is that the Williams does have more static weight
00:33:09towards the rear of the car at the moment.
00:33:11And they did have a lot of trouble in Malaysia getting their front tyres to work as a result.
00:33:15And one wonders whether that's going to be a problem for them as the season develops.
00:33:19But, obviously, where they can get the front to work, it is a very quick car with good traction.
00:33:24Yeah, you're right. You bring up a good point there, Peter.
00:33:26It's these conflicting philosophies.
00:33:29Once you start changing staff, and staff do change from team to team all the while,
00:33:32but you're right, there has been a recent influx of Renault personnel to Williams.
00:33:37And I think these guys, the engineers, kind of get into conflict with each other
00:33:40of which is the best way to go.
00:33:42And it takes possibly a season, frankly, for them to all get together and form a common philosophy
00:33:48and they start moving forward again.
00:33:50But you're right, I mean, this is such a basic part of a chassis setup,
00:33:53shifting the weight forward, front and rear.
00:33:57And for those new to Formula 1 and wondering how the teams do that
00:34:00when the car limit is set at 600 kilos, 605 kilos,
00:34:04the cars are actually manufactured much lighter than that
00:34:07which is something that has come to light recently with the Red Bull chassis
00:34:10with the FIA wondering whether or not their suspension has been set, made too light.
00:34:16But they make the car significantly underweight
00:34:19and then add a lot of ballast, heavy metal to the car underneath the car as low as possible
00:34:23to shift and play with the weight distribution around.
00:34:26But it does make a considerable difference to the balance of the car doing that.
00:34:31Well, I'm still just marvelling at Robert Kubica
00:34:35and what he did in the build-up to the Australian Grand Prix
00:34:37talking about this static weight movement within the car
00:34:40because it turns out that basically BMW said to Robert
00:34:43we think we've solved the problem, we need more weight on the front of the car
00:34:46but Robert, we need, you're heavier than Nick Heidfeld, we need some more ballast,
00:34:49you've got to lose some weight to give us some ballast to play with
00:34:52and so he lost six kilos in the build-up to the Australian Grand Prix
00:34:55to give himself an extra six kilos of ballast, more weight in the nose of the car
00:34:59and transform the car.
00:35:00I think that's fantastic and good to see racing drivers
00:35:03actually contributing to the performance of the car in that way.
00:35:07It's easier to get a driver to lose weight perhaps than it is
00:35:09to find a tenth of a second in the wind tunnel.
00:35:11Well, the guys are skinny as a rake anyway.
00:35:13I mean, for him to lose six kilos, I mean, boy, oh boy,
00:35:16that's a lot of weight for somebody that's right on the weight limit anyway,
00:35:19I'd have thought, still.
00:35:20I can see it now, the Formula One driver diet.
00:35:24Bookstores soon.
00:35:25I'm just going to highlight that.
00:35:27You see how much again that this wing is flexing,
00:35:30on the McLaren last year.
00:35:31We were talking about that.
00:35:33The team's wondering whether or not they would protest that
00:35:36because of the amount of vertical movement.
00:35:38Because...
00:35:39Well, let's listen to Jenson Butler.
00:36:00So, we still haven't got around that problem.
00:36:04Also, if I hit the brakes very hard at high speed,
00:36:08I feel like I'm blocking the rears.
00:36:10Especially in turn one, that's what caused me to run wide
00:36:13on the second to last lap.
00:36:18Aside from that, it was a nice ride.
00:36:23Peter Windsor.
00:36:26Very difficult for the Honda team, of course,
00:36:28working here with Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello.
00:36:31Jenson always running his Brembo brakes.
00:36:33Rubens Barrichello right-footing with Hitco brakes.
00:36:36And when you've got a brake balance problem,
00:36:37you've got brake temperature problems,
00:36:39you've got brake wear problems,
00:36:40the last thing you need are your cars on different brake suppliers.
00:36:44And that's what Honda have got.
00:36:45That's what they've been living with for two years.
00:36:47I think the engineers are just about fed up with it now.
00:36:49But what can they do about it?
00:36:50Neither driver is prepared to change.
00:36:52So, that is a big problem for Honda.
00:36:54But, David, just to go back to your previous point,
00:36:56I'm wondering what happened to the David Hobbs diet,
00:36:58the one that had you so rape-thin
00:37:00when you were racing in Formula 1 back in the mid-60s.
00:37:02I don't know what happened to it.
00:37:03Something went awry somewhere.
00:37:06It doesn't seem to be working at the moment.
00:37:08The Siebkens diet.
00:37:09Not rape-thin.
00:37:10Yes, I got on the Siebkens diet instead.
00:37:16During the off-season, Ferrari and Toyota
00:37:18were the only two teams that came and tested at this track.
00:37:21So, there's been a healthy discussion this weekend
00:37:23as to whether or not that gives either team
00:37:25an advantage over the field.
00:37:27It's a story that'll play out over the next two days
00:37:29as we bring you the Bahrain Formula 1 weekend here on Speed.
00:37:33We'll take a break and return.
00:37:38Welcome back to Bahrain International Circuit.
00:37:41Coming up on 33 minutes remaining
00:37:43in this second Friday practice,
00:37:45watching Nick Heidfeld,
00:37:47who's currently down in 14th place on the timesheet.
00:37:55Pretty much where he spent the morning practice.
00:37:58In fact, at that very same point.
00:38:0014th on the timesheet.
00:38:03Well, Nick Heidfeld, last week in Malaysia,
00:38:07right towards the end of the race.
00:38:08In fact, it might have been the last lap set.
00:38:10The fastest lap of the race.
00:38:11So, Kubica came second.
00:38:12Heidfeld got off to a bad start
00:38:15and worked his way up to the field
00:38:17but set the fastest lap right at the end.
00:38:18So, there seems to be plenty of speed in the BMW,
00:38:20but apparently it's difficult to find.
00:38:22It's a new chassis this year
00:38:24and they're very different.
00:38:25And the drivers have all said,
00:38:27you know, both drivers have said,
00:38:28it's very difficult to set it up.
00:38:30Once you get it set up right,
00:38:31it's absolutely terrific.
00:38:32But getting it there is difficult.
00:38:34And, you know, that might come back to haunt them
00:38:37as the year goes on
00:38:38because you've got to change at every track.
00:38:39Obviously, there's that time there.
00:38:41One and a half seconds off.
00:38:42But, of course, Friday, you know,
00:38:43he might have a lot of fuel on board.
00:38:45Might be doing a long run.
00:38:50Just to add to what David was saying,
00:38:51we heard Robert Kubica
00:38:53after the Malaysian Grand Prix
00:38:54saying that the area in which he felt
00:38:56he was losing ground easiest
00:38:58was in terms of top speed.
00:39:01One has to think that the BMW is quite a draggy car.
00:39:04And if they are constantly finding a top speed problem,
00:39:07that is where it's going to be difficult
00:39:09to set the car up, obviously,
00:39:10because they're going to be trying to run
00:39:12as little wing as they possibly can
00:39:14and still, of course, look after the tyres
00:39:16and have the grip level they need.
00:39:17And that's a very, very difficult balance.
00:39:18An age-old balance,
00:39:19one that we've been having for the last 40 years,
00:39:21but nonetheless, I think they do have
00:39:23a bit of a straight-line speed problem.
00:39:25Nika Rosberg slightly losing the rear under brakes there.
00:39:28This looks to be a problem, a perennial problem here
00:39:30at Bahrain, the back of the car under braking
00:39:33and certainly exacerbated by the loss of
00:39:35what we call engine braking.
00:39:37But, in fact, it isn't engine braking.
00:39:38We've actually gained engine braking
00:39:40because what used to happen electronically
00:39:42is that the engine harmonised with the downshifts
00:39:45and you didn't get that terrible sort of reaction
00:39:48to the engine when you came off the throttle.
00:39:50But now you do, and that's why you're seeing
00:39:52some of that lumpy braking from guys like Rosberg
00:39:55who do hit the pedal pretty hard
00:39:57relative to drivers like, say, Trulli or Hamilton.
00:40:00That's why, exactly, you know,
00:40:02we've been hearing about the rear brakes
00:40:04locking up all the time throughout this year
00:40:07and that's because, you know,
00:40:08we keep on saying they've lost engine braking,
00:40:10but as you just said,
00:40:11they have actually gained more engine braking
00:40:13than they've ever had before
00:40:15because the old software would blip the throttle
00:40:18and when it felt the rear wheel was starting to lock,
00:40:20it would pick up the engine,
00:40:22so it made it very easy for them.
00:40:24But now, of course, they've got to do it themselves,
00:40:25some modulation,
00:40:26so I think you're going to see a lot
00:40:28of front brake wear this year.
00:40:31Still, I would say the biggest problem
00:40:34is the rear traction.
00:40:36The entry is not so bad
00:40:41and I had a small kind of understeer
00:40:45in turn 13 on time-lapse.
00:40:50So, yeah, the balance was a little bit mixed,
00:40:54but I think the balance...
00:40:58Kaz Nakajima speaking very good English.
00:41:02Technology is everything in Formula 1
00:41:04and I think you have something on that, Steve.
00:41:06Yeah, well, look.
00:41:07Kaz there talking about oversteer at the back
00:41:09and then understeer on the front.
00:41:11We noticed the Williams this year
00:41:12also using a similar bridge wing
00:41:15we're talking about that McLaren were using.
00:41:17Here's a split shot we were talking about earlier on.
00:41:19Remember, we were saying that
00:41:20how the McLaren wing,
00:41:21unsupported on that nose section,
00:41:23is free to vibrate up and down.
00:41:25And you'll notice on the Renault right there,
00:41:28it's very difficult to see,
00:41:29but you see right where the Bridgestone B symbol is?
00:41:31There.
00:41:32There's a little vertical strake
00:41:34which joins the Renault bridge element
00:41:37to the nose section,
00:41:38which prevents that frequency movement,
00:41:40that up and down vibration on the wing.
00:41:42Now, technically, to the technical regulations,
00:41:44you could say you're not allowed to have any movement
00:41:46on any component on the car
00:41:48if it's an aerodynamic device.
00:41:49But of course, everything moves in engineering.
00:41:52You can't prevent something moving.
00:41:53If it did prevent it moving completely,
00:41:55it would break.
00:41:56So you have to have a certain amount of
00:41:58supple movement in it to a degree.
00:42:00But none of the teams actually did complain
00:42:02or protest that McLaren wing last year
00:42:04because they said it is not changing the pitch,
00:42:07the angle of the wing, if you like.
00:42:09It wasn't moving around the arc,
00:42:11which would generate more or less downforce.
00:42:13It was just flexing up and down.
00:42:15But a lot of aerodynamicists said,
00:42:16well, you know, they'd be far better off
00:42:18actually making that wing stable.
00:42:20Renault were one of those teams that suggested that
00:42:22because there is only one perfect shape profile to a wing.
00:42:26There'll be one profile that you want to use.
00:42:29And the way to do that is to put a little vertical strake
00:42:31there to prevent it moving.
00:42:33On board with Felipe Massa.
00:42:40I like the sound of a high compression engine revving
00:42:44up to 19,000 RPM.
00:42:46We'll be back.
00:42:51Welcome back.
00:42:52Just under 26 minutes remaining now
00:42:54in this 90-minute Friday practice.
00:42:56Watching Felipe Massa,
00:42:58who just went P1 in the session.
00:43:00Substantially so.
00:43:01Six tenths of a second quicker
00:43:03than Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren Mercedes.
00:43:06Nico Rosberg is now up to third
00:43:08at 133.0.
00:43:10Kimi Raikkonen fourth.
00:43:12And Kaz Nakajima in the Williams Toyota
00:43:14now fifth, followed by Sebastian Bordet
00:43:16in the first of the Scuderia Toro Rosso cars.
00:43:21Sunday here on Speed,
00:43:22step into the wind tunnel.
00:43:24The biggest names, the biggest opinions.
00:43:26Don't be afraid to give Dave a piece of your mind.
00:43:28You may get a chance to do that as well.
00:43:30Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain.
00:43:31Sundays at 9 p.m. Eastern.
00:43:33Live only here on Speed.
00:43:38On board with Nelson Piquet.
00:43:40First time we've seen him this weekend.
00:43:42Moving up to seventh.
00:43:44Bumping David Coulthard.
00:43:46Heikki Kovalainen is ninth.
00:43:48Mark Webber tenth.
00:43:50Robert Kubica eleventh
00:43:53in the BMW Sauber.
00:43:55They're playing possum.
00:43:56Nick Heidfeld down in sixteenth.
00:43:58Yeah, not going like I thought they would,
00:44:01I must admit.
00:44:02Kimi Raikkonen just went purple in sector one
00:44:04with a 29.6.
00:44:07That's the best of the session.
00:44:09Nakajima in Rosberg doing very well.
00:44:11Rosberg in third.
00:44:12Nakajima in fifth.
00:44:13So that's really good for the young Japanese driver
00:44:16to be right up there like that.
00:44:22On board now with Kimi.
00:44:26He's coming up this great S-complex,
00:44:29this long, long, long left and a long right.
00:44:31This long right here puts a bit of load
00:44:33into that left front tyre,
00:44:35which is where that graining comes from
00:44:37that Peter was talking about earlier on.
00:44:39This corner keeps going on and on and on.
00:44:41And the next one is the same.
00:44:46Here's a long straight.
00:44:48Look for a top speed number in the box.
00:44:51I see it quite yet.
00:44:52Kilometres an hour, 315.
00:44:54It's just over 195 miles per hour.
00:45:01We'll get one on the start-finish straightaway here.
00:45:03He jumps into second.
00:45:04So you've got Ferrari's first to second at the moment.
00:45:08I guess that off-season testing did pay off.
00:45:10I guess so.
00:45:12Have we seen anybody yet on hard tyres?
00:45:16Every time we look,
00:45:17they seem to be on the softer of the two compounds available.
00:45:19There's one.
00:45:20Yes.
00:45:21There you see it.
00:45:22That's right.
00:45:23There you go.
00:45:24I don't know how you sense these things, Hobbs.
00:45:26I just don't know how you do it.
00:45:28I have another split screen here I'd like to show you guys.
00:45:30We're talking about brakes on the car.
00:45:32Here's a comparison between the Force India duct.
00:45:35Look at the size of these fellows right here
00:45:37to the relatively small ones that McLaren are running.
00:45:39McLaren typically always like to run a small brake duct on the car,
00:45:42but also this highlights as well
00:45:44that Force India are not able to run one of these bridge elements,
00:45:47unlike McLaren at the bottom there,
00:45:49because the swoop of the nose doesn't drop far enough down
00:45:52to allow them to regulations in their little virtual box
00:45:55where you are allowed and not allowed to build over the car.
00:45:58Force India are not able to run it over the top,
00:46:00but they do connect it to each side of the nose.
00:46:02So that's how McLaren are allowed to do that
00:46:04because they run a more droopy nose
00:46:06and they run bigger brakes on the Force India of the car.
00:46:09But look at all this blanking around here.
00:46:11I mean, you can't see the brake disc at all now on a modern Formula 1 car.
00:46:14It's completely enclosed.
00:46:16And the idea of that is when you put the rim around the car,
00:46:19it controls better the turbulence around the front end of the car there.
00:46:22They're very concerned these days about turbulence on the car,
00:46:25which is why we've seen a Toyota.
00:46:29Renault have been demonstrating with it,
00:46:31and Ferrari running those fairings, static fairings,
00:46:34across the front of the car.
00:46:35McLaren, too, to try and control the airflow,
00:46:38the turbulence around the unshrouded tyres.
00:46:41Now the BMW on board now with Robert Kubica
00:46:45on those little front winglets,
00:46:46they've got those bullhorn things like the McLaren had a couple of years ago.
00:46:50Now they've got that, I suppose, for aiming, is it?
00:46:53That's right.
00:46:54Well, if we have a shot to look further back,
00:46:56you'll see it's a smaller example of how they're running it on the airbox.
00:46:59Willem Touw, the chief aerodynamicist at BMW,
00:47:03copied the design, I should say,
00:47:05looked into a very similar design to how McLaren were running it,
00:47:08saw an advantage, and then just copied it further down as well.
00:47:11And it does give you an idea how you can see the airflow across the car,
00:47:15how it's a holistic approach to aerodynamics.
00:47:19Well, of course, those little fences do straighten up the airflow
00:47:22over the wing surfaces.
00:47:24And, of course, a lot of aeroplanes now,
00:47:26airlines are chasing their fleets to put winglets like that
00:47:29on the end of their wings,
00:47:30because it straightens the airflow out enough
00:47:34to make a substantial difference on their fuel consumption.
00:47:37The amount of fuel that aeroplanes burn,
00:47:39anything they can get, I suppose, is what they need.
00:47:42Well, the little jet we flew down from Milwaukee yesterday
00:47:45had exactly that design onto the wingtip.
00:47:47It did.
00:47:49As you pointed out, David, at great lengths.
00:47:54Well, to anyone that would listen.
00:47:55Gripping the seat in front of him, white-knuckled all the way, I'm sure.
00:48:01Peter Windsor, ALP.
00:48:03Thanks very much, Bob.
00:48:04While we're talking about jets and airports,
00:48:07can I just mention a guy called Colonel Ken Scott,
00:48:10who's in the SOE in World War II.
00:48:11I read his obit the other day.
00:48:13Passed away very sadly on Christmas Day, aged 89.
00:48:16Reading through the obit, I was astonished to see,
00:48:19as an engineer working for the British Army,
00:48:21he designed Bahrain Airport.
00:48:23And that is the airport which the Grand Prix Circus
00:48:26flew into still, basically.
00:48:28So, well done, Ken.
00:48:29I love hearing about these heroes,
00:48:32these hidden heroes that we knew nothing about
00:48:34until we read about them when they passed away.
00:48:37But he sounded like a wonderful guy,
00:48:39and all credit to him and best of love to his family.
00:48:42And while we're on the subject of obituaries,
00:48:45it's our sad duty to recognize the plane crash last week in England
00:48:48that took the lives of five people,
00:48:50including two significant racers,
00:48:53former British touring car driver
00:48:54and championship contender David Leslie,
00:48:57and car owner and racer Richard Lloyd.
00:48:59David, I believe you drove for Richard Lloyd.
00:49:01I drove for Richard Lloyd twice,
00:49:02and we had a lot of fun both times.
00:49:04He was a great guy to drive for,
00:49:05ran some very, very successful teams.
00:49:07He ran the team that won Le Mans with the Bentley in 2003,
00:49:11I think it was, and I drove for him the last time.
00:49:14I drove at Le Mans, was in a Richard Lloyd car,
00:49:16and seated alongside me was Damon Hill,
00:49:19struggling to make his way to World Championship,
00:49:22which he did subsequently,
00:49:23but that was the last time I drove for Richard,
00:49:25who was running the Porsche Great Britain Enterprise.
00:49:28A great guy, lovely family,
00:49:30and terribly, terribly sad that they should go in a way like that.
00:49:36Now, a little earlier on, we were looking at the Renault
00:49:38while we were talking, Peter was talking to us.
00:49:40Just look at the brake disc on this front tyre right now.
00:49:43We're talking about brake wear on the car there.
00:49:46Early on Friday, a lot of brake wear on that Renault.
00:49:50Previous two races, we've been talking about the brake wear on the Renault.
00:49:54I should say how much glow we get from inside the rims on the Renault
00:49:59in comparison to the other guys as they circulate.
00:50:01So I think brake wear is an issue with Renault.
00:50:04We know that those guys, as I was saying,
00:50:05just like Ferrari, Toyota and McLaren,
00:50:07have been working on static fairings around the front of the car.
00:50:14Peter?
00:50:16Yeah.
00:50:18Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you wanted to get in.
00:50:21As we watch Nico Rosberg making his way around the Williams crew,
00:50:24he and Kaz Nakajima both are doing very well,
00:50:27fourth and fifth right now.
00:50:29This morning, they were third and sixth, respectively, in the session.
00:50:32So, after that fiasco in Malaysia two weeks ago,
00:50:36things are looking up, it would appear, for Williams-Toyota.
00:50:39Yeah, certainly.
00:50:40Of course, Nico Rosberg did the fastest lap of the race here at Bahrain
00:50:45in his opening season in Formula 1.
00:50:48In fact, it was the opening race, he did the fastest lap.
00:50:51So, he obviously likes it here.
00:50:56It was great to see Rosberg so happy after that podium in Australia
00:50:59in the season opener.
00:51:00He and his good buddy Lewis Hamilton were dancing up on the podium.
00:51:04We'll be back.
00:51:11Let's ride along with him.
00:51:28Look at the compression.
00:51:29As we watch the car, look at the compression on that front wing,
00:51:31that bridge element we see.
00:51:32Now, under braking, when we get to the end of the straight,
00:51:34you'll see it lift up.
00:51:36No good deed goes unpunished.
00:51:40I don't believe that's the proper racing line.
00:51:47The average monthly high temperature in April at Bahrain is 75 degrees.
00:51:51It's about 10 degrees hotter than that right now.
00:51:55This is what happened to Nico.
00:51:59It could have been a lot worse.
00:52:01Let's have the driver's eye view of it.
00:52:04He goes a bit wide there, then that kerb keeps pulling him out
00:52:06and he can't quite get back.
00:52:08You want to snap it back, otherwise you'll spin the car.
00:52:10Now, he's in the gravel.
00:52:11Didn't want to do that.
00:52:13Mechanics don't like that, do they, Steve?
00:52:14All that gravel inside of him.
00:52:16No, they're not fans of it.
00:52:17Now, he's going on the dirt track around the outside.
00:52:20If he's considerate, he stays on the inside of the car.
00:52:23He's got to be careful.
00:52:25He's got to be careful.
00:52:26He's got to be careful.
00:52:27He's got to be careful.
00:52:28If he's considerate, he stomps the brakes somewhere on the lap
00:52:31back to the pits and tries to eject as much of it.
00:52:36Now, with Sebastian Bordet as we follow the Frenchman around,
00:52:39let's go to Peter Windsor with more on Nico Rosberg.
00:52:43Thanks, Bob.
00:52:44Well, that wasn't the only mistake that Nico has made
00:52:45in the last five minutes or so.
00:52:47Watch Nico now as he approaches turn 10 from the very, very fast
00:52:50left-hand kink turn 9.
00:52:52The car is loaded as he hits the brakes hard.
00:52:54And what happens?
00:52:55He locks the inside front.
00:52:56That's going to happen a lot during the race.
00:52:58That's because tyres wear out.
00:53:00Watch Lewis Hamilton through here.
00:53:01Takes a much wider line through 9.
00:53:03Compromises 9 so he can have a nice flat square car for 10.
00:53:06Difficult to get 9 right if you're running that wide.
00:53:09But it pays off in the race because he's able to do some passing
00:53:12and he's got a much squarer, flatter car going into 10.
00:53:15A very important corner because there's a long straight afterwards.
00:53:17That's why Jarno Trulli, the other driver who takes a wide line there,
00:53:20also had an advantage last year.
00:53:22And the guy I've seen also do that this morning was Sebastian Vettel.
00:53:25Three guys who know what they're doing through there.
00:53:27Nice work, Peter.
00:53:28It's a very difficult corner to set up for that
00:53:30because you have that left-handed downhill approach.
00:53:33So it wants to lift the front wheel up.
00:53:35And there again is chassis set up.
00:53:37It depends how you set the chassis up.
00:53:39If you have it too stiff,
00:53:40obviously it transfers all the weight to the outside
00:53:42and it lifts that inside wheel even more.
00:53:44But obviously a lot of it is depending on where the driver
00:53:47puts the car on the road going into it.
00:53:48There you see it again.
00:53:50Sebastian Bordet who's still lying in 6th spot.
00:53:53He set that time very early on.
00:53:55He's doing extremely well.
00:53:56His teammate, Sebastian Vettel, is languishing down in 20th.
00:53:59And it's not like he hasn't been doing a lot of laps.
00:54:01He's done 26 laps.
00:54:03So why is it such a big difference between the two Sebastians?
00:54:06I'm not quite sure.
00:54:08You know, our NASCAR buddy, Darrell Waltrip,
00:54:10likes to say on the oval tracks,
00:54:13getting into the corner isn't as important as getting off of it.
00:54:16That's where you get guys.
00:54:17Would it be safe to say that about road racing as well?
00:54:20Well, obviously, yes.
00:54:23Coming off the corner is where you make up the ground.
00:54:25But it's very difficult to overtake coming off.
00:54:28You really need to overtake going in.
00:54:30It's easiest to overtake going in.
00:54:32But obviously that comes from coming off the previous corner better.
00:54:37So you can be within a really good out-braking distance to the guy.
00:54:41But it is incredibly difficult to set the cars up.
00:54:45I mean, we keep talking about chassis setup
00:54:47and listening to these radio conversations.
00:54:49I'm just going to say, keep your eye on that front wing one.
00:54:52Carry on talking about this, the compression on the wing.
00:54:55But you're right.
00:54:56You have to set the car up for corner entry,
00:54:58mid-corner on the apex and then corner exit.
00:55:01You want the car to be stable under braking going in
00:55:04so that you have good brakes.
00:55:06Now, look at that wing raise up.
00:55:08That's the shot we wanted to see when we lost it earlier on.
00:55:10But you're right.
00:55:11And from an engineer's perspective,
00:55:13and of course, David, from a driver's perspective,
00:55:15the car throughout each part of the corner is changing all the while.
00:55:19I think I mischaracterized what DW was saying.
00:55:22And not so much passing other cars,
00:55:24but getting the lap time out of the car.
00:55:26Getting off the corner is at least as important as getting in.
00:55:29But oval racing is so different, especially high banked oval racing.
00:55:32I mean, flat tracks like Milwaukee is one thing.
00:55:34But if you go to Daytona, it's a very different kettle of fish
00:55:37because you can maintain the speed everywhere.
00:55:39These corners are all so different.
00:55:41Every one is different.
00:55:42You've got to brake.
00:55:43You're doing 50 gear shifts a lap.
00:55:45Every one of them is a different shape, a different size,
00:55:48a different angle of attack.
00:55:50The road surface falls away, does not fall away.
00:55:53It all makes a huge difference.
00:55:55It's not like oval racing really at all.
00:55:57Yeah, well, he said it at Martinsville last week,
00:55:59and that is tight and flat.
00:56:01So perhaps it's a characteristic of that track alone.
00:56:04Down to Peter Windsor once again.
00:56:06Well, thanks, Bob.
00:56:08It's very difficult, I think,
00:56:09to make a lot of comments about drivers,
00:56:12how much input they should have,
00:56:13whether we should set the cars up perfectly for the drivers or vice versa.
00:56:16But I do think that one specific aspect of lap analysis
00:56:21has been causing more trouble than it's worth.
00:56:23And that is the minimum speed that drivers
00:56:26and therefore cars attain in the middle of corners.
00:56:29Because there's a general belief that the higher the minimum speed,
00:56:32the faster you're going, the better job you're doing.
00:56:34Generally speaking, the lower the minimum speed in the corner,
00:56:37the faster you're going to be 200 yards down the straight after that corner
00:56:41because you've got the load out of the car sooner.
00:56:43So Kenny Raikkonen's minimum speeds are usually lower than Felipe Massa's,
00:56:47but 200 yards down the road, he's faster.
00:56:53Oh, Hamilton hard into the wall.
00:56:56Wow.
00:56:58It's just been displaced by his teammate, Heike Kovalainen.
00:57:02So the pressure on Lewis Hamilton.
00:57:05Wow, that was a big hit.
00:57:07That was a big one.
00:57:11Where are we?
00:57:12There again, you see the value of those asphalted runoff areas
00:57:17because the car had lost a lot of speed.
00:57:20It had all four locked up and it obviously lost a lot of speed,
00:57:23but it was a sideways hit, which are always nasty.
00:57:26Can push your neck over.
00:57:29Seems to be perfectly OK, but...
00:57:31That's the point of the Hans device around his shoulders
00:57:34and those higher cockpit bolsters that we've seen this year.
00:57:39Oh, it's on that little S out of turn three.
00:57:43Let's have a look, see what caused it.
00:57:45Oh, he got it fully sideways off the curb.
00:57:48Wow.
00:57:51This Marshall's got a surprise.
00:57:55There we go.
00:57:58Gets on the curb.
00:57:59Just lost it.
00:58:00Oh, that is a nasty hit.
00:58:02He did not scrape off much speed.
00:58:04Something that Massa was alluding to in his accident at the last race
00:58:08is once you get up on the curb,
00:58:10the cars are so aero-sensitive these days.
00:58:12Once you lose the downforce on the underside of the car,
00:58:15it's just gone.
00:58:16In a heartbeat, it just snaps away from you.
00:58:18It looks like exactly what happened there to me with Hamilton
00:58:21up on the curb and lost it.
00:58:22And that, of course, is also that traction control loss
00:58:25which is not helping on that situation.
00:58:28A lot of damage to that car.
00:58:35And we're back under green for the final five and a half,
00:58:38well, now four and a half, well, five, whatever.
00:58:41Welcome back.
00:58:42The session is green.
00:58:43Let's take a look at what happened to Lewis Hamilton.
00:58:46And notice a couple of things here.
00:58:48As he loses control of the car, watch where he hits the wall.
00:58:52First car, there he is leaving the track.
00:58:55He just gets the end of the tire wall.
00:58:57If he'd missed it about another 10 meters forward,
00:58:59he would have hit the much more unforgiving solid Armco
00:59:03backed by a rock wall on the other side.
00:59:07Saw his hands come off the grip.
00:59:08And watch those corner marshals.
00:59:09Any SCCA marshal will tell you,
00:59:11you have one guy looking up the track,
00:59:13one guy looking down the track,
00:59:14and you have to protect each other.
00:59:16They left the guy whose attention wasn't on Hamilton
00:59:19standing there by the fence.
00:59:21Wow.
00:59:25Now, Kimi Raikkonen has just gone to P1 over Felipe Massa.
00:59:30So the order of the Ferraris at the top of the time charts
00:59:33is now switched.
00:59:34Heikki Kovalainen is now third.
00:59:36Lewis Hamilton remains fourth,
00:59:38followed by the Williams cars of Rosberg and Nakajima.
00:59:41Then Sebastian Bordet doing more good work for STR.
00:59:45Nelson Piquet in the first of the Renaults.
00:59:49And now we've got cars jumping around.
00:59:51Robert Kubica jumps up to fifth.
00:59:53Rosberg to sixth.
00:59:54Nakajima to seventh.
00:59:55Bordet to eighth.
00:59:59What's Fernando Alonso doing here?
01:00:01Put some heat in the tires, and he needs it.
01:00:03He's down in 19th spot at the moment.
01:00:05A cool 2.3 seconds off the pace.
01:00:07We'll have more on getting heat into the tires
01:00:11as the weekend goes on.
01:00:15Be sure to be with us for qualifying
01:00:17at 7 a.m. Saturday morning, Eastern Time.
01:00:23I notice our friends from the IndyCar Series
01:00:25are now using a form of knockout qualifying
01:00:27since their numbers have been boosted
01:00:29by the arrival of what they call the transition drivers
01:00:32from the old Champ Car World Series.
01:00:34I think it's great.
01:00:35I'll qualify now in Formula One.
01:00:36I really like it.
01:00:37I do think, as we were saying at the top of the show,
01:00:39that we should get rid of that fuel period in Q3
01:00:42and just have flat-out qualifying.
01:00:43But the idea of three knockout periods, terrific.
01:00:46I think it's a great idea.
01:00:48Already I've seen...
01:00:49What was it?
01:00:51Already Pat Simmons, Technical Director,
01:00:54or I should say Director of Engineering at Renault,
01:00:57suggesting as we go into Round 3,
01:00:59we're already being caught out by what happened in 2007.
01:01:03The car's not working as well as it should.
01:01:05Problems with the wind tunnel calibrations.
01:01:07But Alonso's on a bit of a fly here.
01:01:09He did his personal best first sector,
01:01:11which is one of the best first sectors that anybody's done.
01:01:15So Alonso really putting his head down now.
01:01:18Everybody's on the track now.
01:01:19Only David Coulthard and Giancarlo Fisichella,
01:01:22plus Lewis Hamilton, of course,
01:01:23are not circulating right now.
01:01:25This is not unusual for Alonso this year.
01:01:27He hasn't been higher than 13th place
01:01:30in any Friday practice thus far this year,
01:01:32all five of them.
01:01:35Well, now with, what, less than two minutes to go,
01:01:37the track is as good as it's going to get, really,
01:01:39before the end of the day is running.
01:01:41Well, it's going to knock it out lap.
01:01:44So you need to get out.
01:01:45You want to be out on track now running.
01:01:46A lot of the...
01:01:47You see, there's still a lot of stones being thrown
01:01:49into the track there that people are dragging on.
01:01:51But for all intents and purposes,
01:01:53it ain't going to get better than it is now,
01:01:55if you want to have a look at some data on the car.
01:01:57Alonso up to 12th.
01:01:58Meanwhile, Felipe Massa just went...
01:01:59Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
01:02:00Oh, come on, boys.
01:02:01Oh, geez.
01:02:03Sutil is having a bad year.
01:02:05And there's rumours already that...
01:02:07That's Fisichella.
01:02:08Oh, that's Fisichella, that's right.
01:02:09Former teammates at Renault.
01:02:11Right.
01:02:12I thought he was pulling out of the way.
01:02:14Both of them should know better than that.
01:02:15I mean, he's...
01:02:17He looked to me like Fisichella was getting out of the way,
01:02:19but clearly he wasn't.
01:02:21Well, no, he definitely wasn't getting out of the way.
01:02:23Here's Massa, who went purple in Sector 1.
01:02:25He'd already knackered the first lap for Alonso
01:02:27by getting away.
01:02:32And now we're being told that was, in fact,
01:02:34Adrian Sutil.
01:02:35It was misfonted by the World Feed.
01:02:37Oh, look at this lap here.
01:02:38Massa, cool.
01:02:39Six tenths quicker than Raikkonen so far.
01:02:42That's a huge leap.
01:02:43That's going to drop him into the 31s.
01:02:46Now he's talking about real lap times.
01:02:48It's the old trackers coming around.
01:02:54How low will he go?
01:02:59Oh, really, a full second.
01:03:01A 31.4.
01:03:02Good call, David.
01:03:03Boy, that is a good lap, isn't it?
01:03:05Fastest in Sector 1, 2 and 3.
01:03:07That'll do it for you.
01:03:09Here it is again.
01:03:10It is Sutil in the Force India car
01:03:13with the red roll bar.
01:03:15And he blocks him badly there that last turn.
01:03:18Now, as we come down here...
01:03:19Now, this is where I thought he was getting out of the way,
01:03:21but he clearly wasn't.
01:03:22Look, he seemed to leave it late.
01:03:24But...
01:03:25I don't know.
01:03:29That's a bit like...
01:03:30That's like Felipe Massa and David Coulthard
01:03:32at Melbourne a couple of weeks ago.
01:03:34At this point, I mean, they're almost side by side.
01:03:37Sutil could claim that he was slightly ahead.
01:03:40But, I mean, there's no way he can just come barging over like that
01:03:43when the Renault is already there.
01:03:45Where does he suppose that Alonso is going to go to?
01:03:48Getting back to the visibility out the back of these cars.
01:03:51Alonso went well to the driver's right.
01:03:55Sutil...
01:03:56But he knew he was there.
01:03:57Well, he had to have known he was there.
01:03:58Check it flat.
01:03:59Timing out.
01:04:03Lewis Hamilton going over the notes.
01:04:05Well, what happened was...
01:04:06See, I just went into the corner.
01:04:08I don't know.
01:04:09I just sort of touched the kerb,
01:04:10and the next thing, it was in the fence.
01:04:11I mean, there must be something wrong with the car.
01:04:13It's the biggest wreck he's had since the Nürburgring,
01:04:15the European Grand Prix qualifying last year.
01:04:19David Coulthard appears to be hustling.
01:04:23David Coulthard has been quicker than Mark Webber
01:04:25all this session,
01:04:26which is really a bit unusual.
01:04:28So, David Coulthard, currently 10th,
01:04:30might improve this a little bit.
01:04:31He's done two of his best personal sectors.
01:04:34The first sector was a very quick one.
01:04:35The second sector was also quick.
01:04:37This should jump him up a little bit.
01:04:40Yes.
01:04:41Mark Webber is not a guy who's used to being outrun
01:04:43by his teammates here in Bahrain.
01:04:45So, that'll be a good intro team battle to watch
01:04:48during knockout qualifying tomorrow morning,
01:04:50beginning at 7 Eastern.
01:04:51So, join us for that.
01:04:55D.C. looks like he's still on the stick.
01:05:01Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton talks it over with the crew.
01:05:03Trying to figure out what went wrong.
01:05:05And with no spare cars available,
01:05:07some mechanics have a lot of work to do
01:05:10to get ready for Saturday in Bahrain.
01:05:12We'll take a break and return.
01:05:17Welcome back to the Bahrain International Circuit.
01:05:20Looks like they have a bit of an oval course
01:05:21set up down there.
01:05:23Multipurpose, you might say.
01:05:25That's it for Friday practice.
01:05:26Here are the results of the second session.
01:05:28Well, Ferrari looking pretty good at the moment.
01:05:301.3 seconds quicker than Heikki Kovalainen.
01:05:33Third spot in the McLaren.
01:05:35Lewis Hamilton right behind, who had a big crash.
01:05:37Robert Kubica, much quicker than his teammate Heidkopf.
01:05:39For some reason or another,
01:05:40Nico Rosberg and Nakajima looking good in the Williams.
01:05:43David Coulthard, much quicker than his teammate, Webber,
01:05:45which is a bit unusual.
01:05:46And Sebastian Bordet there in ninth,
01:05:48doing very, very well.
01:05:49His teammate is down in 20th.
01:05:51And Nelson Piquet, the first of the two Renaults.
01:05:54His teammate, Alonso, behind him.
01:05:56So, some strange shuffling in teams here.
01:05:59Out of the top ten.
01:06:0011th through to 16th.
01:06:01Jenson Button, the first of the Honda runners.
01:06:032.2 seconds off the pace of Fernando Alonso.
01:06:05Now with Renault, of course.
01:06:072.3 seconds off the pace.
01:06:09Webber, Trulli and Glock for Toyota.
01:06:11And Rubens Barrichello in the other Honda.
01:06:13Heidfeld, Fisichella, Sutil, Vettel.
01:06:15And then the best friends at Super Best Friends.
01:06:17Takuma Sato and Anthony Davidson round out the time sheet.
01:06:20And that'll do it for Friday practice
01:06:22for round three of the Formula One season,
01:06:24the Grand Prix of Bahrain.
01:06:26But stick with us here on Speed for Formula One
01:06:28all weekend long.
01:06:30Tomorrow at 7 a.m. Eastern time,
01:06:32three rounds of knockout qualifying.
01:06:34The Ferraris looking good, but you never know
01:06:36what McLaren or perhaps BMW have up their sleeves.
01:06:39Once again, that's at 7 a.m. Eastern time.
01:06:42Then finally join David, Steve, Peter and myself Sunday,
01:06:45also at 7 a.m. Eastern,
01:06:47for live coverage of the Grand Prix of Bahrain.
01:06:49Kicking things off, as always, with the Acura pre-race show,
01:06:52Peter Windsor will be live on the starting grid.
01:06:55For David Hobbs, Steve Matchett and Peter Windsor,
01:06:57I'm Bob Varsha.
01:06:58We'll see you Saturday at 7 a.m. Eastern
01:07:00for qualifying from Bahrain.
01:07:02Until then, so long, everyone.