Chinese GP: Bridgestone Friday Practice

Bridgestone's soft tyre proved to be the fastest for Vodafone McLaren Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton who topped the times on the opening day of practice for the Chinese Grand Prix.

Hamilton set a 1min35.217secs time midway through the afternoon practice session at a cool and dry Shanghai International Circuit. Hamilton's team-mate, Jenson Button, went fastest in the morning practice session, using the hard compound to set a time of 1min 36.677secs.

Q&A with Hirohide Hamashima - Bridgestone Director of Motorsport Tyre Development

What was significant about today's running?
"Today we faced a dirty and dusty track and we experienced relatively cool conditions, although not as cold as it was yesterday. As expected, there was not a lot of grip given by the track, although this improved through the day. We saw graining, particularly on the front tyres, although this was only mild and no cause for concern."

How do you expect this allocation to work over the weekend?
"The soft compound provided the fastest lap time today and a quicker warm-up, although the overall lap time difference was not as big as we have seen at some tracks. This could mean that some of the top teams opt for the hard compound in Q1 tomorrow to save their softer tyres for the later sessions. Of course, the last three out of four races here have been wet so the weather, as always, will be the most important consideration for tyre performance."

More F1 News from Bridgestone Motorsport

Stats of the Day:
Practice One 10:00 - 11:30: 
Driver 		 Team			Time 	    Tyre 
Jenson Button    Vodafone McLaren	1m 36.677s  H
Nico Rosberg     Mercedes GP F1 Team	1m 36.748s  H
Lewis Hamilton   Vodafone McLaren	1m 36.775s  H 

Practice Two 14:00 - 15:30
Driver 		 Team			Time 	    Tyre
Lewis Hamilton   Vodafone McLaren	1m 35.217s  S
Nico Rosberg     Mercedes GP F1 Team	1m 35.465s  S
Jenson Button    Vodafone McLaren	1m 35.593s  S

Compounds used: Hard / Soft

Temperatures 	 Ambient      Track 	   Weather
AM - Practice 1  12C-15C      19C-26C 	   Sunny
PM - Practice 2  15C-16C      27C-24C 	   Sunny