It may not have been
BMW Sauber, but there was still an unfamiliar face at the head of the times in Saturday morning's free practice session at Istanbul Park, as
Mark Webber headed a
Red Bull 1-3 ahead of qualifying.
Continuing the theme of comebacks after adversity, the Australian bounced back from his Friday afternoon shunt to set the fastest time of the Turkish Grand Prix weekend so far, clocking 1min 27.030secs around the challenging Istanbul circuit. The effort was more notable as the session started wet - for the third time this weekend - with a lot of the rubber laid down on day one absent once again.
With no further rain during the 60-minute session, however, a dry line was quickly established, allowing times to tumble throughout. Webber duly moved to the top of the timesheets in the final minutes, heading a Renault-powered top three completed by 'works' driver
Fernando Alonso and RBR team-mate
David Coulthard. It remains to be seen, however, whether teams have concentrated on qualifying or race strategy.
As has become the norm, the expected frontrunners did not feature prominently, preferring to keep their powder dry ahead of qualifying.
Felipe Massa was the best of the pacesetters, in fifth overall, while
Lewis Hamilton made the top ten for
McLaren. Their respective team-mates settled for eleventh and twelfth, as the likes of
Nico Rosberg,
Jarno Trulli,
Timo Glock,
Jenson Button and Nelson Piquet Jr filled the remaining top ten spots.
BMW Sauber, however, featured even further down the list, having not exactly set the world alight on Friday.
Robert Kubica, who many would have tipped as a threat for pole, was only 16th, with team-mate
Nick Heidfeld splitting the two Force Indias in 19th.
Giancarlo Fisichella and
Adrian Sutil will hope that the session is not symptomatic of their Saturday pace failing to live up to expectation, especially with the revised qualifying cuts prompted by the absence of
Super Aguri.
