Robert Kubica topped the first practice session for the 2010 Australian Grand Prix as Renault showed its potential.
The Pole looked strong throughout the session and topped the timesheets by around two tenths of a second from Nico Rosberg of Mercedes GP. Renault’s pace was underlined by Vitaly Petrov’s ninth place in the session.
Paul di Resta was impressive on his Force India testing debut, with the young Scot managing to lap withing two tenths of his team-mate Tonio Liuzzi.
However the session did not run without drama, with the Sauber team in particular enduring a chaotic 90 minutes. Around half way into practice, Kamui Kobayashi brought out the first red flag of the day after he struck a cone on the inside of turn 11 and damaged his front wing.
Unfortunately this would not be Kobayashi’s final incident as the Japanese driver crashed on his next out lap, at turn 3, with a suspected front wing failure – possibly as a consequence of his earlier accident.
Team-mate Pedro de la Rosa also stopped out on circuit with an apparent technical gremlin.
Meanwhile it was a case of deja vu for the new teams, with Virgin and Lotus suffering hydraulic issues once more.
Traffic also played a part in the proceedings and presented itself as an ominous problem for the weekend ahead. This is coupled with the announcement that the pitlane speed limit for this weekend has been reduced from 100 km/h to just 60 on the grounds of safety.
Pos Driver Team Time Gap Laps 1 Kubica Renault 1:26.927 22 2 Rosberg Mercedes GP 1:27.126 0.199 18 3 Button McLaren 1:27.482 0.555 22 4 Massa Ferrari 1:27.511 0.584 18 5 Vettel Red Bull 1:27.686 0.759 23 6 Alonso Ferrari 1:27.747 0.820 21 7 Hamilton McLaren 1:27.793 0.866 22 8 Buemi Toro Rosso 1:28.014 1.087 21 9 Petrov Renault 1:28.114 1.187 25 10 Liuzzi Force India 1:28.192 1.265 18 11 di Resta Force India 1:28.537 1.610 25 12 Schumacher Mercedes GP 1:28.550 1.623 19 13 Alguersuari Toro Rosso 1:28.572 1.645 21 14 Webber Red Bull 1:28.683 1.756 22 15 de la Rosa BMW Sauber 1:29.465 2.538 13 16 Barrichello Williams 1:29.712 2.785 18 17 Hulkenberg Williams 1:30.249 3.322 26 18 Kobayashi BMW Sauber 1:31.588 4.661 5 19 Trulli Lotus 1:31.652 4.725 13 20 Kovalainen Lotus 1:31.654 4.727 26 21 di Grassi Virgin 1:32.831 5.904 25 22 Senna HRT 1:33.401 6.474 24 23 Chandhok HRT 1:34.251 7.324 19 24 Glock Virgin 1:34.925 7.998 8
