Raikkonen pips Ocon on day two of Silverstone test
Kimi Raikkonen topped the second day of testing at Silverstone, with a lap time of 1m30.665s with less than an hour of the session left.
It was Esteban Ocon at the top of the timings by the lunch break, with nearly sixty laps. The young driver filled the Mercedes seat for a second day in a row, focusing on aero tests at the start of the session before putting on the soft tyres to put in the time, his fastest being a 1m31.212s, a second and a half faster than Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, who was working on aerodynamics testing.
At the other end of the timing screens was Jordan King in the Manor car. The 1:37.417 wasn’t really all the 22-year-old could do, with King working on specific aero evaluations in the morning. He was able to improve to a time of 1:35.060 before the end of the day, finishing the day tenth.
The morning session was a relatively quiet session, besides Sergio Sette Camara’s near miss. The Brazilian took his first spin in a Formula One car, literally, with a half spin on the pit straight after he lost the rear end of the Toro Rosso car he was testing. He recovered, narrowly avoiding a high-speed accident that would have ended his morning.
Once again, the afternoon session began with rain, and the few cars that had ventured out onto the circuit early on headed to the pits. It wasn’t long before the shower passed, though, and the intermediate tyres were taken out of their blankets.
Today, the track dried quick enough for drivers to get some dry running in the afternoon session. Just over an hour into the session, Haas’ Santonio Ferruci was on slick tyres and trying to improve on the 1:33.934 he’d set during the morning session.
Valtteri Bottas was in the Williams on day two, after Alex Lynn took the car for a spin yesterday. The Finn was running the double-decker rear wing, last seen in Barcelona, and finished the session fifth.
An hour until the end of the session, it was still Ocon on top, though the rest of the field were getting closer and closer to the Mercedes’ time, but it wouldn’t stay that way. With less than an hour left, the super soft tyres were put on Raikkonen’s Ferrari and the Finn was able to set a 1:30.665, the fastest time of the two days.