Raikkonen tops 2nd practice in Singapore

Kimi Raikkonen

Kimi Raikkonen turned the fastest lap in the 2nd practice session for the Singapore GP while his teammate Sebastian Vettel choked again and brushed the wall while on a qualifying simulation, damaging his car, and sitting out most of the session with the 9th fastest time.

Lewis Hamilton was 2nd quick just 0.011s behind and Max Verstappen third 0.522s behind.

Running in the proper night-time conditions that the drivers will face both in Saturday’s qualifying and Sunday’s race, Raikkonen posted a time of 1m 38.699s on the pink hypersofts – the very softest tire in Pirelli’s range, making its third appearance of the year this weekend – but Hamilton’s quickest lap was just 0.011s shy of the Finn’s time.

Renault once again headed the midfield in Singapore, with Carlos Sainz Jr. going P6 on a track where he recorded his best-ever Formula 1 finish of fourth last year with Toro Rosso.

Fernando Alonso had a good run for 8th quick 1.7s of the pace and in doing so, buried his younger teammate Stoffel Vandoorne who was 2.4s off the pace. Its obvious Alonso is still very quick for his age.

Vettel's damaged Ferrari gets service in garage

Vettel’s uncharacteristic mistakes in Azerbaijan, France and Germany – along with his setback at the last round – have helped hand Hamilton an advantage in the title race, with German now trailing the Brit by 30 points with just seven races to go.

The Ferrari star admitted he needs to get the best out of his SF71H challenger – and go error-free – if he is to stand any chance of winning a fifth world title.

“I think it is pretty straightforward for me. I think the biggest enemy is me. We have a great car, I have something to play with and we have all the chances to do it in our way," said Vettel.

“Obviously Lewis is the leader at the moment, he’s the one ahead and he is the one to beat, but I think we have all the chances – and how much they could be better by now and so on is a different question.

“We still have a very good chance, and as I said, we will be our first enemy and not him as a person or them as a team. I think we need to look after ourselves. If we do that we have a good chance to do well and win races and things look good."

Practice 2 Results