Bahrain GP: Mixed results for Williams Martini in FP2

Team Summary:
Under lights the Williams Martini team would commence their second Friday practice session. The opening one had seen Felipe Massa and Lance Stroll finish in an encouraging fifth and sixth. On the soft tyre the first time would be set by Grosjean with a 1m:34.286. The soft tyre was the tyre of choice for the early runners as Vettel went quickest with a 1m:32.615. Grosjean was second followed by Alonso and Magnussen. Ocon was now third but at the front it was changing as Bottas went quickest with a 1m:32.614 followed by Vettel and now Sainz. Hulkenberg was up to third while for Williams their drivers were sixth and eleventh after their first runs.

Verstappen was now third but this would become fourth as Hamilton went fastest with a 1m:32.290. But Raikkonen would go quicker with a 1m:32.277. Sainz would pull off the track with smoke coming from his car. First out on the super soft tyre was Vettel with just over an hour remaining. Vettel would set a 1m:31.310 to be quickest by 0.967s. More drivers were coming out on the super soft tyre with Bottas going second with a 1m:31.351. Felipe would go third on the super soft tyre but Hulkenberg would move ahead. Hamilton was on a quick lap which would see him go quickest in the first sector but would abort his lap for a second time. Hamilton would finally set a 1m:31.594 to be third. Raikkonen was now fourth followed by Hamilton, Hulkenberg and Felipe.

Ricciardo was now in third and Verstappen eighth. With thirty minutes remaining both Williams drivers were on runs on the supersoft tyres. Both drivers would complete the session with no gains in terms of times. The second session saw Felipe continue his good performances but for Lance it saw him go backwards. Lance would say after the session "It's just FP2 that was the only negative really. All session, I was really struggling with the car. FP2 was a bit of a bizarre session."

Felipe Massa:
Felipe would come out on a new set of soft tyres but his first lap was very slow setting a 2m:01.452, most likely as he checked out his brakes. His next lap was a 1m:34.336 to be sixth. Felipe would drop to ninth behind Grosjean. Felipe had pitted having completed five laps. While in his pit he would drop to tenth. Felipe would return this time on the super soft tyre and he would set a 1m:32.079 to be third behind Bottas. Felipe would pit currently in seventh having completed four laps on the option tyre. With forty five minutes remaining Felipe was back out running on used super soft tyres. Felipe continued to circulate around the track having completed six laps so far on his second run on the super soft.

Lance Stroll:
Lance would take to the track running on soft tyres that he had used on his installation lap earlier in the day. Lance's first lap was a 1m:34.983 to be seventh. He would drop to ninth then eleventh. This would become fifteenth as the session progressed. Lance continued to put in laps on the soft tyre but would pit after completing nine laps. Lance was still in his pit having dropped to seventeenth. With fifty five minutes remaining Lance would return running on the super soft tyre. Lance would set a 1m:33.361 to be only sixteenth. "The radio's horrible, I can't hear a word you're saying," Lance would tell his engineer.

He would pit after his run on the super soft tyre. After a short stop he would come back out running on used super soft tyres. Lance would cut short his session coming back in complaining that his feet were burning saying that he was "in so much pain." "I needed to jump out of the car, it was really, really painful," said Lance. He added: "I tried to bring it to the end [of the session] but when I was told to do another lap for the virtual safety car I said 'I really cannot do it, sorry'."