2011 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

Previous race

Vettel won the inaugural Indian Grand Prix, leading every lap from pole and setting the fastest lap to claim his first Grand Slam. Button finished second, Alonso third, Webber fourth. Several first-lap collisions occurred at Turns 1 and 3. Hamilton made contact with Massa at mid-race. Karthikeyan became the first Indian driver to compete in the Indian Grand Prix.

Between-race developments

Vitantonio Liuzzi returns to HRT, having been replaced by Karthikeyan for the Indian Grand Prix to allow him to race in front of his home crowd. Ricciardo moves back to the car he has raced in since Silverstone.

Williams driver Pastor Maldonado takes a ten-place grid penalty for exceeding his engine allocation. His eighth engine was damaged beyond repair when he retired from the Indian Grand Prix; drivers are entitled to eight engines over the season without penalty.

In the week before the race, the teams agreed to trial several new Pirelli tyre compounds during FP1 to provide feedback on the planned 2012 tyre specifications.

Formula Renault 3.5 champion Robert Wickens drives for Virgin in FP1, replacing d’Ambrosio. Jean-Éric Vergne drives for Toro Rosso. GP2 Series champion Romain Grosjean drives for Renault.

Tyre choices

Pirelli brings the white-banded medium compound as the prime and the yellow-banded soft as the option.

Practice

Button set the fastest time in FP1, one tenth ahead of Webber and Hamilton. Hamilton had led early on Pirelli’s experimental 2012 development tyres, but was surpassed by Webber and Vettel before Button’s late effort. Alonso and Massa each had several off-track excursions. Petrov was forced to abandon his car in the final run with engine trouble. Barrichello was also sidelined by technical problems and did not set a lap time.

FP2 was notable for two separate incidents at Turn 1: Vettel spun and became lodged in the outside barrier early in the session, while Alonso crashed at the same corner. Hamilton then set the fastest time, two-tenths faster than Button’s best from the morning session.