First Free Practice in Sepang Maintains Suspense

Well, all right, so Ferrari was the fastest in both the morning and afternoon sessions, as expected. This time, though, it was Felipe Massa who was fastest in both sessions, and not his teammate, Kimi Raikkonen, who won the first race. But aside from Ferrari, the second session in Malaysia today confirmed that Renault is doing better here than in Australia. Giancarlo Fisichella was second fastest, and only 0.130 seconds behind Massa. Heikki Kovalainen, in the other Renault was only a couple of tenths of a second behind him. And Raikkonen was fourth fastest. The McLaren-Mercedes cars seemed to be suffering a little here, finishing the second session in ninth and 12th positions, with Lewis Hamilton again faster than Fernando Alonso.

So the predicted reigniting of the championship is truly likely to happen, I think. On the other hand, the prediction of thunder storms today, tomorrow and during Sunday's race, seems at the moment remote. The sky is quite blue at the moment, with only a few clouds. It is very, very hot and humid and the drivers are suffering as usual. I am thankful for an air conditioned press room! I trek out into the heat of the paddock for interviews planned in advance, and no loitering - it kind of dulls the usual life of the paddock, though, so I'm sure a few thunder storms would be welcome both on the track and in the paddock.