Heidfeld had done 6 laps in the morning when his front-right brake failed and his wheel locked up, causing him to put an end to his FP1 running. And only minutes later, disaster struck for his Russian teammate Petrov, who made his first and last run-off excursion of the day after the front left-hand brake of his car failed when approaching Turn 9.
A few minutes after the first practice session was over, a team's spokesman revealed that Renault would keep both its cars into the garage throughout the 90-minutes practice session in the afternoon, in order to investigate the mechanical issues that occurred in the morning.
According to reports, although it was initially believed that Renault's problems are related to their braking system, it now appears the failures happened in the suspension area, more specifically with the system's upright arms. However, that information was neither confirmed, nor denied by team officials.
The Renault spokesman added that the team will look into the problem and, as soon as they'll find a solution for it, they will give the go-ahead for track running for both Heidfeld and Petrov.
Heidfeld's best time before his car failure occurred was good enough for 7th place in the overall timing reports, while Petrov finished the morning in the last position.
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