Driver error admits Heidfeld

Renault's Nick Heidfeld visited the gravel trap in both practice sessions on Friday, knocking off his front wing on both occasions and costing the team valuable track time.

'It's not a good day for Heidfeld. He's got the speed but he's just making those silly mistakes.' BBC Radio 5 live analyst Anthony Davidson said during the practice second session.

When it was on the track Heidfeld's Renault looked competitive, during the first practice session despite completing only five laps the German was fifth fastest before his accident.

In second practice he completed 26 laps and was only 1.117 seconds behind Vettel's fastest time of the day for Red Bull.

“Today obviously wasn’t what we wanted, after I spun off in the first session and then again in the second which were both my fault.' He confessed to formula1.com.

'I hope it’s a good omen because in Malaysia we also didn’t have many laps on the Friday and then we had a good result. Given that I only had five laps in the first session, it was surprising how fast I was, we were both in the top 10. There’s still some more in the car but the gap is a bit bigger than we would have hoped for. As expected, we achieved quicker lap times when using the softs over the hards, and it was good that we managed to use both.”

If the Renault's qualify well tomorrow, their starts could prove to give them a big advantage off the grid and could well put them in the mix for a third consecutive podium finish.