If both are on the front row again, and in whatever order, victory should
follow given the difficulties in overtaking.
As Mark Webber conceded yesterday following his win here last year, it is easy
enough to “create a train” behind when tyre management is of the essence.
Behind the Mercedes duo were Ferrari
pair Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa, both around half a second off
Rosberg’s pace, with Webber sixth quickest in his Red
Bull.
The 36-year-old Australian was then followed by Lotus team-mates Kimi
Raikkonen, four points behind championship leader Sebastian Vettel going
into this race, and Romain Grosjean.
The Frenchman’s practice, however, came to an end with almost an hour to run
after he smacked a barrier on the exit of Ste Devote at the bottom of the
hill, dismantling his front-left wheel.
The marshals, as is customary in Monaco, lifted the car off track and clearing
away the debris as cars continued to flash by.
With the circuit clear, the session was red-flagged moments later as kerb
damage was detected at turn 13, on entry to the swimming pool complex, that
required a four-minute repair.
Both incidents came at a point when the teams were putting the cars through
their qualifying-run paces having switched to the quicker of the two Pirelli
compounds available this weekend, the super-soft.
McLaren’s Jenson Button was eighth on the timesheet, 1.2sec adrift, with Red
Bull star Vettel and Force India’s Paul Di Resta completing the top-10, the
Scot 1.287sec down.
Given the pace of the Mercedes, there may be issues for the likes of Marussia
and Caterham come qualifying as British rookie Max Chilton and Dutch new-boy
Giedo van der Garde were both over four seconds back.
Overall practice times:
1 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes 1min 14.759secs
2 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) Mercedes 1:15.077,
3 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari 1:15.196
4 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari 1:15.278
5 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull 1:15.404
6 Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Lotus 1:15.511
7 Romain Grosjean (Fra) Lotus 1:15.718
8 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren 1:15.959
9 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull 1:16.014
10 Paul Di Resta (Gbr) Force India 1:16.046
11 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India 1:16.349
12 Sergio Perez (Mex) McLaren 1:16.434
13 Nico Hulkenberg (Ger) Sauber 1:16.823
14 Pastor Maldonado (Ven) Williams 1:16.857
15 Esteban Gutierrez (Mex) Sauber 1:16.935
16 Daniel Ricciardo (Aus) Toro Rosso 1:17.145
17 Jean-Eric Vergne (Fra) Toro Rosso 1:17.184
18 Valtteri Bottas (Fin) Williams 1:17.264
19 Jules Bianchi (Fra) Marussia 1:17.892
20 Charles Pic (Fra) Caterham 1:18.212
21 Max Chilton (Gbr) Marussia 1:18.784
22 Giedo van der Garde (Ned) Caterham 1:19.031
(Edited by Lucy Kinder)