MONACO GP – Hamilton tops a dramatic practice one narrowly from Rosberg
Lewis Hamilton was fastest in the first practice session for this weekends Monaco Grand Prix. The Mercedes driver was .1 of a second faster than his team-mate Nico Rosberg and Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel.
Hamilton narrowly beat his team-mate after the German after a series of laps where they were going quicker than each other on track. This showed a return to form that has not been with Hamilton in recent races but it wasn’t problem free as he made a few errors on track
Hamiltons error’s were nothing compared to what Rosberg inadvertently caused to Jenson Button. Rosberg suffered a puncher after bringing up a drain cover at Ste Devote which then punctured Button’s front right tyre and shattered the front wing of McLaren’s Jenson Button, the next car along.
Vettel was nearly half a second down on Hamilton but was three tenths faster than Daniel Ricciardo who is running the new upgraded Renault engine which is reckoned to gain two tenths per lap even around Monte Carlo’s windy streets.
McLaren were hoping that they could show progress on track because of the low speed nature of Monte Carlo, but there was no sign of it with Fernando Alonso ended the session 13th, 1.882secs off the pace, two places and 0.082secs ahead of Button.
Mercedes used the session to test the new ultrasoft tyres which showed on there first outing they have very good pace.
In Monte Carlo accidents and incidents are never two far away. The first incident was from Williams’s Felipe Massa who went off at turn one early on damaging the left-side of his car against the barriers.
Jolyon Palmer was another casualty of the circuit after a error at Tabac better known as the swimming pool. McLaren were just a little off were they are expected to be with Button finishing eleventh and Fernando Alonso thirteenth.
Eyes now shift to the second session this afternoon which gives a better idea of the pecking order.
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