Second and third on Friday afternoon

By BMW Sauber F1 Team
September 12 2008

Just in time for the second free practice session, the sun began shining on Monza. Nonetheless, the BMW Sauber F1 Team drivers, Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld, had to cope with mixed conditions in the first half of the session as some sections of the track dried faster than others.

Nick was the only BMW Sauber F1 Team driver to complete a stint on a still partly wet track. At this point in time the German set a personal fastest time of 1:34.229 minutes to secure fourth position for the time being.

In the second half of the session, the track had dried completely and Robert and Nick could finally start their preparation work for the remainder of the weekend. Before long, it became obvious that the "Autodromo Nazionale di Monza" still seems to suit the BMW Sauber F1 Team particularly well.

On his eighth lap, Robert took the lead for the first time, but had not yet delivered his best performance: with half an hour to go he went out again and improved his lap time even further. Robert improved his lead by clocking a personal best time of 1:23.931 minutes on his 13th lap. Just a few minutes later, Nick crossed the line, on his 20th, lap just fractions slower than his team-mate to take second position on the time sheets with his 1:23.947-minute lap.

Up to the dying minutes of the session, the BMW Sauber F1 Team drivers remained the only ones to have clocked lap times below the 1:24-minute mark. Then, however, their competitors went out on a light fuel load to set fast lap times while Nick and Robert focused on continuing their preparation work by carrying out long-runs.

Nonetheless, only one driver succeeded in beating the times of the drivers racing for the Munich and Hinwil based squad: Ferrari's Kimi Räikkönen took the lead with a 1:23.861 minute-lap but Robert and Nick remained second and third respectively.

Altogether, the second practice session at Monza proved to be a truly promising start to the Italian Grand Prix weekend for the BMW Sauber F1 Team. In tomorrow's third practice session, starting at 11:00hrs CEST (10:00hrs BST), Robert and Nick will complete their preparations for qualifying and the race.