Buzzin F1 - Formula One Blog

Today is the opening day of the 2008 Formula 1 Championship and Ferrari and McLaren seem as usual the teams leading the way.

Kimi Raikkonen was quickest in the morning practice session with a fastest lap time of 1:26.461 and Lewis Hamilton took the afternoon session with a 1:26.559.

The afternoon session is normally the time the teams put aside for race preperation so lap times are not taken too much into account.

Mark Webber was the second fastest in the afternoon session for the Red Bull Renault team but team mate David Coulthard suffered engine problems in the morning session and ended the afternoon session getting towed back to the pits by the safety car with another mechanical problem although he still ended the day the fifth fastest.

Felipe Massa was the third fastest man in the Ferrari after surviving a big spin exiting the fast turn 12 ahead of the second McLaren driver, Heikki Kovalainen, Coulthard and Raikkonen.

Toyota driver, Jarno Trulli was a promising seventh place despite spinning out late on in the session after putting his left rear tyre on the grass, while team mate Timo Glock on his debut claimed a respectable tenth place.

Williams did not get off to a great start after the FW30 seemed prone to rear brake lock ups and over-steer but seemed to pick up some pace in the second session with Nico Rosberg taking eighth slot while team mate Kazuki Nakajima came in sixteenth.

Force India Ferrari driver Giancarlo Fisichella was an impressive ninth fastest while second driver, Adrian Sutil had a few off track moments and came in seventeenth.

Jenson Button in the Honda was in eleventh with Rubens Barrichello in fourteenth. The BMW Sauber team who many are considering to be the dark horse of the season, seemed a little of pace today with Nick Heidfeld in twelfth and Robert Kubica in sixteenth.

Fernando Alonso in the Renault could only manage thirteenth place while team mate Nelson Piquet on his debut came in at nineteenth out of the twenty two runners.

The two Toro Rosso drivers, Sebastian Vettel and Sebastien Bourdais were in eighteenth and twentieth places respectively with the final two runners being Takuma Sato and Anthony Davidson for the Super Aguri team.