Things really got underway in Friday's second practice session at Spa, when Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time on a dry track. The Englishman lapped his McLaren in 1m 47.201s, to displace Timo Glock who had earlier taken over pacesetting from Mark Webber. The German posted 1m 47.217s for Toyota, the Australian 1m 47.329s for Red Bull. In between them was Kimi Raikkonen, third fastest for Ferrari on 1m 47.285s.
Yet again the times were incredibly close, the more so given the length of the circuit. The first 15 cars were separated by seven-tenths of a second - and the Brawns were not among them…
A flurry of late improvements saw Romain Grosjean vault up to fifth for Renault on 1m 47.333s, chased by Force India's Giancarlo Fisichella (1m 47.506s), Toyota's Jarno Trulli (1m 47.559s), BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica (1m 47.578s), Toro Rosso's Jaime Alguersuari (1m 47.579s), Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel (1m 47.602s), Toro Rosso's Sebastien Buemi (1m 47.702s), McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen (1m 47.743s), Force India's Adrian Sutil (1m 47.790s), Renault's Fernando Alonso (1m 47.862s) and Williams' Kazuki Nakajima (1m 47.961s).
Nick Heidfeld was 16th for BMW Sauber on 1m 48.017s, then came Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello in the Brawns, which were some 1.5s off the pace in sector two alone as they continued their back-to-back set-up experiments.
Nico Rosberg was another who never really got going in his Williams, taking 19th fastest time in 1m 48.360s. At the back, Luca Badoer’s trials at Ferrari continued as the best he could muster was 1m 49.211s.
After a brief hiatus to clear away debris - a loose wheel fairing from Badoer's F60 - at Blanchimont after six minutes of the session, the main dramas came at the end when Raikkonen went off at Stavelot, Vettel at Les Combes and Hamilton at Hautes Fagnes, none of them sustaining damage. Alguersuari’s Toro Rosso also rolled to a halt with mechanical problems.
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