F1: Hamilton Leads Soggy Second Silverstone Practice

Formula 1

F1: Hamilton Leads Soggy Second Silverstone Practice

Lewis Hamilton topped the time sheet in P2 at Silverstone, where rain continued to fall...

Jared Turner | Posted July 06, 2012 Silverstone (GBR)

Rain remained the order of the day for Friday's second practice at Silverstone Circuit, where torrential downpours gave drivers no running in the dry after doing the same in the morning session.

The super-wet track also made for tricky driving conditions — as World Championship leader Fernando Alonso most notably can attest.

Just as the 90-minute session neared a close, the Spaniard spun and hit a tire barrier with his Ferrari, which lost a front wing in the process.

It was a better outing, meanwhile, for championship rival Lewis Hamilton, who tiptoed around the slippery course to post a quick time of 1:56:346 in his McLaren.

Kamui Kobayashi (1:56:474), Michael Schumacher, Nico Rosberg and Sergio Perez completed the top five.

As usual for a practice run in heavy rain, times posted were virtually meaningless, giving teams little significant data ahead of Saturday's final practice and three rounds of knockout qualifying.

More rain is expected for Saturday, with precipitation possible but not as likely for Sunday.

Alonso, the 2011 winner of the British GP, became the first repeat winner of 2012 two weekends ago with a victory in Valencia.

The Spaniard leads the driver standings by 20 points over Mark Webber and 23 over Hamilton entering Sunday's ninth round of the World Championship.

SPEED.com will stream Saturday's final practice live at 5 a.m. ET.

Jared Turner is an Associate Editor for SPEED.com, covering NASCAR and Formula One, and is an Editor for TruckSeries.com. His professional motorsports writing career began in 2005.