Valtteri Bottas remained the quickest man in second practice for the British Grand Prix after an error by Lewis Hamilton while on his qualifying simulation.

The Finn posted a 1:28.496s on the supersoft tyres to finish just under half a tenth clear of his team-mate, however, the local favourite was on a much faster lap on the red-marked tyres before running wide at Becketts and ruining his lap.

His initial best lap on the soft compound was still good enough for second, highlighting the pace Hamilton has, with Ferrari, led by Kimi Raikkonen, three-tenths slower but able to get both cars back ahead of both Red Bulls albeit with very little to choose between them.

A difficult qualifying simulation for Daniel Ricciardo also saw the Australian fall to sixth behind teammate Max Verstappen, who would later be involved in a near coming together at Club corner with Felipe Massa in the race simulation, an incident that is being investigated by the stewards.

Nico Hulkenberg led a tightly congested midfield with less than a second covering the five teams from P7 to P18. Interestingly Renault would be at both ends of that with the German's team-mate Jolyon Palmer 18th.

Four different teams would fill the final four places in the top 10 as Massa, who was one of three drivers to spin at Becketts during the session, was eighth ahead of the McLaren of Fernando Alonso.

Esteban Ocon would complete the top 10 for hometown team Force India but he and team-mate Sergio Perez, who was only 13th, are likely to improve significantly in time for qualifying.

The Toro Rossos will be looking for gains to make Q3 too as Carlos Sainz, who was another spinner at Becketts early on, finished 11th for the second consecutive session, only seven thousandths faster than team-mate Daniil Kvyat in 12th.

Haas appears to be one of the teams most struggling despite high expectations before the weekend, Romain Grosjean was again only 14th with team-mate Kevin Magnussen 17th after missing Practice 1 to allow Antonio Giovinazzi to run.

Lance Stroll and Stoffel Vandoorne are taking their time to build confidence in the high-speed corners with the two finishing 15th and 16th respectively on their first day in an F1 car on a race weekend Silverstone.

Finally, the two Saubers once again brought up the grid with Marcus Ericsson three-tenths clear of team-mate Pascal Wehrlein but eight-tenths behind Palmer in 18th.