Well, not an awful lot to glean from FP1 other than Merc, Ferrari, and Alonso look close ish on mediums. McLaren a gap back in 5th (they’ll beat RB Visa when the engines are turned up). Red Bull looked to have a bit up their sleeve on the opening runs but then some little gear gremlins seemed to occupy them so we didn’t get a comparison to the second runs on medium of Ferrari, Merc and Alonso.
So RB, not red bull, (****ing stupid) go out of softs and set 1:32.869 in the test Ferrari did 1:29.921s on softs this P1 is nowhere. I still expect a 1:28 time for pole.
my understanding is everyone was on softs in the first 4 cars, we have Verstappen on mediums right beside the aston of alonso roll on P2
We're really going to know jack until this weekend is done, then we should have a bit of a better picture on where everyone is at.
this is the time now thats most representative of Quali. I expect some times but at least 0.5s slower than pole
Verstappen whinging and moaning all the way. Hamilton has done a 1:30:751. nothing special so far but on softs verstappen 1:31:161 Awaiting a really doors blown off perofrmance from anyone thus far.
basically HAAS hulkenberg 1:30.884 we can take from that that we are 2 seconds minimum for ultimate time.
The only thing I can’t tally up is Hulkenberg P7 next to Max- even if his engine is turned up I still think there’s a lot of performance coming tomorrow from the big boys. Are Red Bull running very low power mode after the gearshift worries earlier?
First sector - Lewis Hamilton (29.037) Middle sector - Oscar Piastri (38.665) Final sector - George Russell (22.567) so ultimate is 1:30:269 right now. S1 and S3 are straights so a straight power debate theres no way mclaren are the fastest in the bends.
the teams seem to be pounding round doing laps rather than a quali run on softs. I doubt we get an answer today.
Remember folks, take anything you see here with a pinch of salt. We have no clue of setup, fuel loads etc. just practice.
Unfortunately I have a feeling that Red Bull are holding back in a huge way. That said it does look like we might have a competition behind them. As a comparison: 1:30.374 lewis P2 2024 1:29.708 max quali 2023 1:30.907 Alonsa Practice 2 2023
the next whinge from the brat is on upshifts. gear box change and grid penalty incoming? He's every excuse under the sun for not being on top.
Yeah it’s obvious that somethings hidden - it’s more about how big the gap is. Ferrari are surely way faster than this- their top speeds are usually the best so they will get stronger in quali too. That Haas is the key clue though- we will see tomorrow. Piastri with a good long run there too!
