Alonso leads the way in Brazilian second practice
A low-fuel run by Alonso at the end of the session put him on the top-spot
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By Matthew Champion. |  |
Friday, 16, Oct 2009 10:12
By Adam Leveridge
Fernando Alonso topped the times with a last-ditch, low-fuel run at the end of the session, ahead of Sebastien Buemi and Rubens Barrichello in the first of the Brawns.
It seemed as though second practice would start under dry conditions with track and ambient temperatures similar to the morning session, but a small shower moved across the circuit just as the green light came on at the end of the pit-lane.
Button suffered a severe bout of understeer during the first practice session of the weekend, however he was quick at the beginning practice two, despite still struggling with understeer and being on a long 18 lap run on heavy fuel.
Vettel was the first to enter the 1m12s with a 1m12.9, although he was quickly eclipsed by Sebastien Buemi in the Toro Rosso, who recorded a time of 1m12.7.
After visiting the pit-lane, Button returned to the track to record the quickest time of the session overall with just over an hour to go.
Having topped the timesheets in P1, Webber went sixth fastest on his first timed lap but he was able to improve significantly to go fastest with a 1m12.696, only to be beaten again by Button by eight hundredths of a second.
Buemi continued to pump in quick times and he soon appeared at the top of the times again when he set a 1m12.357 and that's where he stayed while drivers completed long runs with heavy fuel loads.
Nico Rosberg meanwhile continued to improve, setting the seventh quickest time and then jumping up to fifth with a 1m12.6 with less than 40 minutes to go in the session, ahead of Vettel.
Both Renault's struggled to get off the bottom of the leaderboard until about an hour into the session when Alonso became the first of the pairing to enter the 1m12s to go 12th quickest.
Romain Grosjean was on Alonso's pace for much of the session, but couldn't breach the 1m12 barrier in his Renault, staying down in 15th.
With just over 20 minutes to go in the session, Giancarlo Fisichella got stranded at the exit of the pit-lane when he stalled his Ferrari, at which point he was down in 20th and last place.
Fisichella got out of his car, but returned to the cockpit minutes later to help the marshals move it to a safe position behind the barriers.
In the dying minutes of the session, teams switched onto the soft, option tyres and ran their drivers on low-fuel.
Alonso was the first to improve his time, going fastest with a 1m12.314, beating Buemi's lap by three hundredths of a second.
However, with the exception of Barrichello who slotted into third place overall on his final run, nobody else was able to improve because of a slight drop in track temperature.