Ahead of today’s sole practice session the air temperature is 16 degrees C, while the track temperature is 35 degrees. It is bright and sunny.
Russell was quickest yesterday morning, edging out his teammate, the McLarens and Ferraris. However, in the afternoon it was Piastri who was quickest, narrowly out-pacing Antonelli.
The tweak made to the engine rules for qualifying clearly won’t go far enough, leaving fans fearing what we are going to witness at circuits like Baku, Monza and Spa.
While at full throttle yesterday, while clipping, Russell lost around 60km/h (37 mph) in 130R, Verstappen 54km/h (33 mph) and Colapinto an amazing 98km/h (60 mph), as F1 boasted of drivers taking The Esses flat-out. This is not F1, certainly not as far as qualifying is concerned.
What’s really sad is to see certain drivers – unsurprisingly those racing for the teams that have best mastered the new rules – along with broadcasters and members of the media defending the changes, telling us how wonderful what we are watching really is. Those of us of a certain vintage are aware of the truth, how fantastic and inspiring this sport can be, newcomers won’t know any better.
Reliability continues to be an issue for certain teams, and while Verstappen continues to be unhappy with his Red Bull, Hamilton also noted a negative performance from his Ferrari.
Talking of reliability… in the moments before the session, McLaren reveals: The team have identified an issue on the ERS pack which now needs to be replaced. It’s unlikely Lando will participate in FP3 but we are still working on the car.
The world champion lost track time yesterday afternoon, as did Lindblad who didn’t even get to post a time.
Colapinto is first out, as he begins his first flying lap he is joined by his Alpine teammate. Both are on mediums.
As Perez heads out on softs, Colapinto posts a benchmark 33.665.
Gasly posts a 32.860 as Hamilton, Bottas and Stroll head out.
Hamilton posts a 32.283 on the softs as the Haas pair head out.
As more drivers emerge, on a mixture of softs and mediums, Gasly posts a 32.251 on the mediums.
Hamilton reclaims the top spot with a 31.056 as Hulkenberg goes third, ahead of Colapinto, Bearman and Perez.
Leclerc heads out on softs, the Red Bulls, Mercedes and Piastri yet to emerge.
The Monegasque stops the clock at 31.018 as the Mercedes pair finally head out, as does Piastri.
Quickest in the first two sectors, Antonelli (softs) posts a 30.418 as Lindblad goes fifth and Lawson sixth.
Bottas complains that he was impeded by Ocon in 130R, as Piastri appears to impede Hulkenberg.
Perez takes a trip across the grass at the chicane.
Russell goes third with a 30.545, 0.127s off his teammate’s pace.
Last out are the Red Bulls and Albon. Verstappen goes sixth on the mediums and his teammate fourteenth, also on the yellow-banded rubber.
Piastri goes fourth with a 30.801.
The Piastri/Hulkenberg incident will be investigated.
Quickest in S3, Leclerc goes top with a 30.229, as Bortoleto posts a 31.501 to go seventh, the best of the medium runners.
Piastri improves but remains fourth, as Russell goes second with a 30.395, 0.165s off Leclerc’s best.
Onboard with Verstappen shows the Dutchman continuing to struggle.
Bortoleto improves to sixth, while Audi teammate Hulkenberg is eighth.
Hadjar improves to eleventh, 0.07s off his teammate and two places down.
“Are you still looking for some high-speed front,” Verstappen is asked. “Yes, but a massive amount, not a tiny bit,” he replies.
Antonelli is the first to break the 1:29s barrier, however his teammate responds with a 29.918.
With 23 minutes remaining, Norris heads out on softs.
His first flying lap sees him go eleventh with a 31.463.
There is a lot of activity in the Red Bull garage on Hadjar’s car.
Despite going quickest in S2, and being on fresh rubber, Piastri posts a 30.364 but remains fourth.
Antonelli crosses the line at 29.362 and his teammate at 29.616.
A big spin for Bearman exiting Spoon as Norris improves to sixth with a 31.094. However, the McLaren driver is demoted when Hulkenberg goes fifth with a 30.658.
With 15 minutes remaining, the qualifying sims are about to get underway.
“He was just a bit too aggressive,” says Ayao Komatsu of Bearman’s spin.
Leclerc improves but remains third while Verstapepn, now on softs, improves to seventh with a 30.910.
“What is going on with the shifts, it’s horrendous,” complains Verstappen.
All are on softs bar Bearman who is sticking with mediums.
Hamilton improves to fifth but remains over a second off the pace.
Norris goes sixth with a 30.600, as Ocon goes thirteenth.
Replay shows Lawson having to take a wild detour at Spoon to avoid a slow Haas on the racing line.
Gasly improves to tenth as Lawson goes twelfth.
“Mate, this Ferrari is off his head,” complains Lindblad amidst some traffic-based silliness.
The session ends. Antonelli is quickest, again, ahead of Russell, Leclerc, Piastri, Hamilton, Norris, Hulkenberg, Verstappen, Bortoleto and Gasly.
Hadjar is eleventh, ahead of Lawson, Lindblad, Ocon, Bearman, Albon, Colapinto, Sainz, Bottas, Perez, Stroll and Alonso.
The 0.254s gap to his teammate aside, the 0.867s gap to Leclerc and 1.002s to Piastri must fill Antonelli and Mercedes with confidence, as the German team appears set for another front-row lock-out, leaving McLaren and Ferrari to fight for the next couple of rows.
A good session for Audi and to an extent Racing Bulls, while Red Bull clearly has work to do if only to lead the midfield fight.