Zoom A good start to the weekend for Felipe Massa

It took some time to get going, but the opening practice session of the Turkish Grand Prix weekend saw Felipe Massa, something of a specialist at this 5.338km circuit, head the timesheets for the Ferrari team with a best lap of 1:27.323s, six tenths faster than in the same session last year.

While Massa led the way, it took almost half of the 90 minute session for the action to get underway due to some wet patches on the surface at turns three and eight. Once the 20 runners decided that the circuit was dry enough to run, they found much lower than expected grip levels leading to almost every driver either running off track or going for a spin.

One man clearly not comfortable with his car was Kimi Raikkonen. The championship leader completed three rather erratic laps before pitting his F2008 and did not run again as the team clearly had both a handling issue and a mechanical problem on the car. The Finn would end the session slowest of all at 3.4 seconds off the pace of Massa.

Heikki Kovalainen used a set of soft tyres late in the session to close the gap from four-tenths to just over a tenth behind Massa while McLaren Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton posted the third fastest time in the second MP4-23. Once again, McLaren looked fast on fresh rubber, while Ferrari needed a few laps to get the tyres up to pressure and temperature to get the lap time.

Fernando Alonso proved that Renault’s improved pace last time out in Barcelona was no fluke as he set the fourth fastest time albeit half a second shy of Hamilton. Team-mate Nelson Piquet was another eight-tenths adrift in ninth position.

Jenson Button vaulted up the order in the final minutes to record the fifth fastest time in his Honda as team-mate Rubens Barrichello started his record breaking 257th Grand Prix weekend with the eighth fastest time. Kazuki Nakajima and Nick Heidfeld split the Honda duo.

Toyota showed well in the early stages of the session, but found themselves bumped down the order as the session progressed. Timo Glock was tenth fastest ahead of Jarno Trulli. Over at BMW Sauber and with Heidfeld seventh fastest, Robert Kubica climbed from his F1.08 before the chequered flag and was 12th fastest as a result.

Nico Rosberg set the 13th best time in the second Williams ahead of the Force India Ferrari duo of Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella. Red Bull Renault meanwhile did not show much pace with Mark Webber and David Coulthard down in 16th and 17th respectively ahead of sister team Toro Rosso Ferrari who has Sebastien Bourdais 18th and Sebastian Vettel 19th.

Earl ALEXANDER
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