---
title: "Hamilton 0.7s clear of Red Bull in second practice"
canonical: "https://readmotorsport.com/2018/06/22/hamilton-0-7s-clear-in-second-practice/"
type: "post"
language: "en-GB"
author: "Kyran Gibbons"
section: "F1 News"
published: "2018-06-22T15:56:18Z"
modified: "2018-06-22T15:56:39Z"
---

# Hamilton 0.7s clear of Red Bull in second practice

Lewis Hamilton topped the timesheet by 0.7 seconds in second practice for the French Grand Prix, while Mercedes’ team-mate Valtteri Bottas lost 40 minutes due to a water leak.

Mercedes continued to demonstrate strong pace in FP2 following the team’s Hamilton-led one-two in opening practice.

Hamilton recorded an early benchmark on the supersoft tyre – 0.241s clear of Bottas’s first run on the soft compound.

Switching to the ultrasoft tyre for a qualifying run, Hamilton posted a 1m32.539s benchmark. This was 0.7s clear of the Red Bulls in second and third, with Hamilton gaining 0.5s of his advantage in the final sector alone.

Bottas failed to record a time on the ultrasoft tyres. He returned to the garage with 40 minutes of FP2 remaining after the team discovered a water leak that brought his session to a premature end.

In second and third, the Red Bull duo of Daniel Ricciardo and Max Verstappen were separated by 0.028s.

The Ferrari pairing of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel followed in fourth and fifth. Raikkonen’s personal best was 0.887s adrift of Hamilton. The Finn spun on the exit of Turn 2 early on in the 90-minute session.

Vettel’s fifth place was secured with an early qualifying simulation run. Haas’s Romain Grosjean ended up sixth, just 0.010s behind Vettel suggesting that Ferrari withheld performance.

Having missed the qualifying simulation run, Bottas slid to an eventual seventh place with his initial soft tyre time.

Fernando Alonso ran an alternative programme during the session, opting to complete his qualifying run in the closing minutes. He improved to eighth place on his first lap of the final run, but spun and stalled at Turn 3 on his second attempt.

Kevin Magnussen and Pierre Gasly rounded out the top 10.

Gasly’s Toro Rosso team-mate Brendon Hartley was forced to pull over in the final 10 minutes of FP2 with a suspected Honda power unit issue. Small flames in the exhaust exit were visible.

Hartley’s issue prompted a virtual safety car. The only red flag of the session was deployed when Force India’s Sergio Perez lost his left-rear wheel entering the Mistral Straight.

Perez had set a personal best in sector one immediately prior to the detachment during his qualifying simulation run. The cause of the issue is unclear. He did manage to return to the track for the final two minutes of the session, but remained 19th on the timesheet.

Following his FP1 crash, Marus Ericsson did not run in FP2 with Sauber needing to build-up a spare chassis for use during the rest of the weekend.