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Lewis Hamilton - Source: Reuters -
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Formula One's latest controversy turned serious when all but one
of the top seven cars in practice for Sunday's Australian Grand
Prix ran with bodywork considered illegal by most teams.
Only Mark Webber drove with conventional rear underbody sections on
his Red Bull. The Australian was fourth quickest but quickly
declared he would be nowhere near that fast in qualifying.
Williams, Toyota and Brawn GP are the three teams using the
contentious rear diffuser, said to give them an advantage in terms
of grip and airflow.
Williams driver Nico Rosberg dominated both 90-minute practice
sessions, leading the timesheets throughout.
The Brawn of Rubens Barichello was second ahead of the Toyota of
Jarno Trulli with Webber fourth in the day's second session.
Jenson Button's Brawn finished fifth while the Toyota of Timo Glock
was sixth and Kazuki Nakajima's Williams seventh.
Red Bull boss Christian Horner led a protest to the FIA against the
use of the radical diffuser but early on Friday morning race
stewards ruled it legal, allowing the cars to race.
This means the issue will go to the FIA's court of appeals and it
could be months before the results of the Australian Grand Prix are
finalised.
Webber said no one would know the real affect of the diffusers
until race day.
"No one here knows the ultimate pace until we get going on Sunday
and even then we might see some teams not show their full pace on
Sunday if they've got something up their sleeve so I think they
will be very keen to keep this advantage if they can,
legality-wise, which so far they seem to have done," Webber
said.
"But I don't fear there will be two different championships in the
race.
"I think it will still be a competitive grand prix and that should
not get in the way of what the ruling is.
"The drivers, as you know, can't do much about this stuff, it's up
to the boffins to sort it out."
Rosberg said his car had worked extremely well with the new
equipment.
"In both sessions sector two was working really well. There are
only two real corners in the sector but it's really interesting and
it feels good in the car," Rosberg said.
"After a winter of testing it's good to get out on a new, fresh
track and we seem to be in a better position than we
thought."
Defending champion Lewis Hamilton confirmed the trend of
disappointing pre-season test results for McLaren by finishing a
lowly 18th in practice, one spot behind teammate Heikki
Kovalainen.
"Obviously we are not as quick as we would love to be but we are
working very hard," Hamilton said.
"In general it's a good car, it's just a general lack of grip
everywhere pretty much, it's not particularly in one area of the
track, it's everywhere.
"The guys back at the factory are working very hard to rectify that
but it's no quick fix," he said.
There will be another practice session Saturday morning before
qualifying in the evening.
