Canadian GP_FP1 - Rosberg makes the difference!!

12/6/11,

The German driver proved the speed of Mercedes GP in the first free practice!!

Many people said before the Canadian Grand Prix that Mercedes GP would be very strong on this track and Nico Rosberg confirmed their tellings. The German scored the best time in the first free trial period and set the tone to his team, being in fact more than half a second faster than the second driver. 

Behind Rosberg Fernando Alonso found himself with Ferrari. The Spaniard moved quickly from the start of the season and was the one of the first drivers who joined the track starting doing fast laps. In the first 4 positions of the classifications were found only Mercedes and Ferrari, with Michael Schumacher in the third position and Felipe Massa in fourth. Further back were the two of McLaren , Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, with Rubens Barrichello, Paul di Resta, Nick Heidfeld and Nico Hulkenberg to follow. 

A different face than usual was showed by the Red Bull. Apart from that were far behind, they saw Sebastian Vettel losing control of his car in the last chicane crashing with the 'wall of the champions'. The German had managed to do just 8 laps. But Mark Webber, who completed 30 laps, moved into shallow water and had only the 12th best lap-time. 

In this first period the teams were available to test the softer compound which will be used in Canada (with the very soft) and the middle testing compound of Pirelli which will be used in the upcoming races.

Results!!

1 N. Rosberg MERCEDES 1:15.591 /32
2 F. Alonso FERRARI 1:16.139 /0.548 /27
3 M. Schumacher MERCEDES 1:16.549 /0.958 /0.41 /30
4 F. Massa FERRARI 1:16.658 /1.067 /0.109 /26
5 J. Button MCLAREN 1:16.676 /1.085 /0.018 /20
6 L. Hamilton MCLAREN 1:16.842 /1.251 /0.166 /10
7 R. Barrichello WILLIAMS 1:16.990 /1.399 /0.148 /28
8 P. di Resta FORCE INDIA 1:17.294 /1.703 /0.304 /26
9 N. Heidfeld RENAULT 1:17.445 /1.854 /0.151 /28
10 N. Hulkenberg FORCE INDIA 1:17.549 /1.958 /0.104 /20
11 S. Perez SAUBER 1:17.662 /2.071 /0.113 /27
12 M. Webber RED BULL 1:17.820 /2.229 /0.158 /30
13 V. Petrov RENAULT 1:18.458 /2.867 /0.638 /31
14 V. Petrov RENAULT 1:18.506 /2.915 /0.048 /15
15 D. Ricciardo TORO ROSSO 1:18.648 /3.057 /0.142 /35
16 S. Vettel RED BULL 1:18.852 /3.261 /0.204 /8
17 P. Maldonado WILLIAMS 1:18.932 /3.341 /0.08 /20
18 J. Trulli LOTUS 1:19.274 3.683 /0.342 /20
19 H. Kovalainen LOTUS 1:19.422 /3.831 /0.148 /30
20 K. Kobayashi SAUBER 1:19.577 /3.986 /0.155 /26
21 J. D΄Ambrosio VIRGIN 1:19.838 /4.247 /0.261 /31
22 V. Liuzzi HRT 1:19.960 4.369 /0.122 /23
23 T. Glock VIRGIN 1:20.520 /4.929 /0.56 /21
24 N. Karthikeyan HRT 1:20.839 /5.248 /0.319 /27