Schumacher and Hamilton head sunny practice in Italy - New drivers join the pack in Free Practice at Monza
Published by Christine
This is F1Minute - Schumacher and Hamilton head sunny practice in Italy.
With the sun shining over the Monza circuit, drivers got some decent dry running in, making quite a change to the washed out sessions last week in Spa. It was Michael Schumacher who led the way in FP1, his fastest time set about halfway through the session.
Teammate Nico Rosberg was also doing well up in third, with Jenson Button sandwiched between them. Further back, Jérôme D'Ambrosio made his return with Lotus, posting the 15th fastest time to Kimi Räikkönen's 7th, whilst new Chinese driver Ma Qing Hua was last, and just about two seconds off Pedro de la Rosa.
Lewis Hamilton took over the top spot for second practice, with McLaren securing a 1-2 in the timesheets. Fernando Alonso was third, but the Ferrari driver was struggling with reliability problems on both the brakes and the gearbox. D'Ambrosio closed the gap to his new teammate, finishing the day 12th to Räikkönen's 6th, and it was a good afternoon for Force India who nabbed 7th and 8th in the final Friday session.
