• Canadian Grand Prix - FP2

Alonso: Red Bull still favourite

ESPNF1 Staff
June 10, 2011 « Mercedes making progress with race pace | »
Fernando Alonso expects to see Red Bull at the top of the timesheets on Saturday © Getty Images
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Fernando Alonso said Red Bull was still the favourite to take pole position despite setting the fastest time in Friday's practice sessions for the Canadian Grand Prix.

Sebastian Vettel lost time in the first session after crashing in to the 'Wall of Champions' but recovered to set the early pace in FP2 before Alonso eventually beat him by 0.3s. Alonso said it was nice to set the fastest time as he had not been focussing on being quickest, but that Red Bull would improve on Saturday.

"We did not concentrate on the times or anything," Alonso said. "So it is always positive to see yourself in the first four or five positions, but today is not really important. We also topped the practice in Monaco and then in qualifying Vettel was one second quicker than us - we know tomorrow is the day to put everything into it and we know Red Bull will be very strong and probably the favourite.

Alonso also said that with rain forecast for the rest of the weekend, Friday's running could turn out to be redundant.

"The rain is forecast, tomorrow it is supposed to rain and especially Sunday so all the job we did today is maybe just for practice because everything can change for tomorrow. We will stay focused and get ready for a change."

Kamui Kobayashi and Jerome d'Ambrosio both hit the wall on the exit of turn four to bring out the red flag on two occasions on top of Vettel's morning crash. Alonso said that mistakes were a product of the degrading tyres coupled with the close proximity of the walls.

"At the end of the session you put on the super soft tyre and you've done already 30 to 40 laps of the track so you try to be a little bit close to the walls to take a bit more kerb, and this is Canada - any little mistake puts you in the wall.

"We see the accidents normally at the end of runs, the tyres were already a little degraded - we saw Vettel crash after a 12-lap run and these other cars were with old tyres. So we know the combination of Pirelli is not easy to drive when they degrade, plus the Canada circuit is a good combination - nice to watch and a bit risky for us."

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