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Hamilton challenges Red Bull pace
2011-05-20 16:14:55
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// Read more on Andrew's blog"We made some small steps forward today," said Hamilton. "We improved a couple of small areas. The front wing seems to be a little bit better. Globally it seems to be not too bad."
When asked if his performance means McLaren are now closer to Red Bull, Hamilton replied: "I don't know. From the times it looks great. Usually when we get to qualifying they end up switching something on and they're half a second quicker. Undoubtedly they are still the quickest car."
The Red Bulls were quick to follow the lead of Renault's Vitaly Petrov by running on the softer 'option' tyres that will be used in qualifying, which Vettel has dominated so far this year.
Vettel set a lap that was two seconds faster than the quickest car up to that point, and when Webber then went faster still it seemed to prove the assumption that Red Bull would dominate this event.
“I'm not happy with the balance of the car. It's pretty unpredictable. It's something I've got to work on and improve for tomorrow”
Jenson Button"The weekend is off to a not bad start," said Webber. "The usual suspects are going to be there - Ferrari and McLaren. It's been like that for two and a half years so I don't think it's going to change here."
The Circuit de Catalunya is probably the toughest test of a car's aerodynamic capability on the calendar, an area in which Red Bull are known to excel.
Webber was on pole position by nearly a second here last year and went on to dominate the race and the team were expected to continue in that vein this season, in which their car has had a bigger general advantage than in 2010.
But McLaren and Ferrari were hopeful before practice that they would move closer to Red Bull, with Alonso saying he would be "disappointed" if he was a second behind the blue cars.
And practice suggested that qualifying and Sunday's race may be closer than expected.
After the Red Bull drivers had set their initial times, Button came out and could manage only to get within 0.7secs of Webber.
That moved Lotus reserve driver Karun Chandhok, acting as BBC 5 live's analyst, to say: "Red Bull look like they've got the best part of a second on the field. McLaren are 0.7secs away, which is about where we'd expect them to be."
However, Hamilton reset perceptions with his lap and Alonso also showed good pace at various times - he was held up by Renault's Nick Heidfeld on his quickest lap.
Alonso's team-mate Felipe Massa was 0.7secs adrift of the Spaniard and also had a narrow escape from the barriers after running wide at Turn Five.
"That was close, very close," Massa said over his car-to-pit radio. "Yes, I saw," replied his engineer Rob Smedley.
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