There were top ten places on the timesheets at Silverstone for both Renault drivers, Rubens Barrichello, Lewis Hamilton and Jarno Trulli.
Renault
Fernando Alonso: "It was a normal Friday for us. We need to improve the car, but in the second practice session we were quite happy with the result. However, we know that we will have a very tough fight in qualifying tomorrow and that one or two tenths can make a big difference in terms of position. So we are still trying to find a little bit more from the car, some extra tenths to really maximise our potential, but we've definitely moved in the right direction today."
Nelson Piquet Jr: "It was a busy day and we managed to get a lot done, including the usual set-up work and tyre evaluation. As always at Silverstone it was quite windy, but it didn't cause too many problems and we managed to improve the car quite a bit, especially in the afternoon. We also tried out the new developments that we have this weekend, including the new front wing. We now have a lot of information to go through to try and make the most of the final practice session tomorrow morning."
Brawn GP:
Rubens Barrichello: "We had a reasonable day and made some good progress on the balance particularly in the second session. There is a lot of work ahead for us tonight however and the pace of our closest competitors was impressive which we need to have a look at. We will have to see what tomorrow will bring but hopefully the track will come towards us and we can have a good day."
Jenson Button: "We tried a few different evaluations with the aero today and initially struggled as I had no grip in either the high or low speed corners. The wind also really affected the car's performance today. We made improvements towards the end of the afternoon session so we have some good information to look at tonight to try and make further progress before qualifying."
McLaren
Lewis Hamilton: "It took a while to get used to the car this morning. It feels a little different from what we've been running in previous races. Generally, I'm very happy with the balance but, with a revised car and on a high-speed circuit like this, it takes a bit longer than usual to find the limit. It's no secret that we're lacking speed in the faster sections. But the car wasn't too bad today. The balance was good, we've made some set-up changes and it now appears to be fairly consistent. But this has already turned out to be one of the best weekends of the year for me because I'm at my home grand prix and the fans are incredible here - I've seen and felt their support from the very first lap I did today."
Heikki Kovalainen: "Firstly, it's great to be back at Silverstone because it's a circuit I love. I got pole position last year and I really enjoy driving here. We know we face a tougher weekend this season because we're lacking grip, but the balance of the car didn't feel too bad this morning. As Lewis is running without KERS this weekend, we now have to analyse the balance of both cars and see what we'll do for the rest of the weekend. We're definitely making progress. It's still difficult to say whether it's an advantage to be running KERS, but I felt I was getting a laptime benefit from the system. This weekend will be all about developing our car and seeing what difference the changes make to both Lewis's and my pace. The whole team is pushing like crazy and we're getting a better understanding of our car. Whatever happens, we are definitely going to learn a lot of useful things about the car this weekend."
Toyota:
Jarno Trulli: "I had a trouble-free couple of sessions working through the usual programme of evaluating the different tyre compounds and looking at various set-ups. The car feels pretty good but as usual here at Silverstone it was very windy. This makes it quite difficult to set-up the car and it's not ideal when it comes to evaluating different set-ups because the conditions change from lap to lap. But we had no other issues and we just need to improve the outright performance a little bit for tomorrow in order to be closer to the top. I am still optimistic."
Timo Glock: "It has been a reasonable start for us on the whole. We did quite a few laps and looked at various different set-ups. We had no serious problems but of course there are areas we need to work on before qualifying to get the maximum out of our package. The balance is not ideal at the moment but we have the chance to improve that tomorrow morning. If you look at what happened in Turkey, where we made a big step forward on Saturday morning, then we can be pretty hopeful for this race."
