Kimi Raikkonen fastest on second day of Silverstone F1 test
Kimi Raikkonen was fastest for Ferrari as the two-day F1 test concluded at Silverstone on Wednesday. It was the second and last of the two in-season sessions, and thus the last chance for teams to do any R&D away from a race weekend.
Rain in the afternoon affected the run programs of teams, although it dried later in the day, and Raikkonen set his time on soft tires in the final hour.
As yesterday only three current race drivers were in action in their regular cars, with Raikkonen joined by Valtteri Bottas at Williams, and Jolyon Palmer at Renault.
Once again it was very much a day for the test and development drivers, with seven of them in action. Santino Ferrucci continued at Haas, his fellow teenager Nikita Mazepin had a second day at Force India, while Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly did more laps with Mercedes and Red Bull respectively.
"I'm really happy about today," said Gasly, who had limited dry running yesterday. "We got more than 100 laps, which was really good. A lot of mileage on the medium tires, a lot of long runs in which I could really get attuned to the car. We tested many things for the team, which was the most important thing and I tried to give really good feedback and to get the best out of all those laps, because it's not every day you get the chance to drive a Formula One car, especially with Red Bull."
New faces today were Stoffel Vandoorne at McLaren, Jordan King at Manor, and Sergio Sette Camara at Toro Rosso, the latter enjoying his first ever F1 test outing, although electrical problems cut it short.
"I had a lot of fun out there and it was great to work with a big team and drive at such an historic track like Silverstone," said the Brazilian. "It's even more impressive to drive an F1 car here. It was a complete day, I drove consistently and I leave with a good feeling."
Meanwhile Pacal Wehrlein continued 2017 Pirelli development work with the two-year-old Mercedes, the German ending the day at the bottom of the times.
