Photo: Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team
The session witnessed two red flags as the gravel got on the track and later Pierre Gasly crashed in Turn 13. Because of the crash later in the practice the session was resumed for the last two minutes. The standings were mixed, behind Antonelli finished Norris, Verstappen, Hamilton and Hadjar.
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Right at the beginning, as Isack Hadjar went on the track, he complained that he has the wrong visor on his helmet, so he returned into the garage to get in changed. After three minutes all cars except for Oscar Piastri were out on the track, all cars were on the medium tires. By this time McLaren was dealing with a hydraulic issue on Piastri’s car from FP1.
With 10 minutes into the session all drivers except for Liam Lawson, Nico Hulkenberg and Oscar Piastri had their first fast times set. The fastest was Kimi Antonelli with time 1:46:911 seconds and Isack Hadjar, Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc lined up behind him.
12 minutes into the session there was a red flag as there was gravel on the track. By this time Verstappen complained about shifting of his car. After five minutes the session was resumed and the majority of the cars got back on the track.
A couple of minutes later, Liam Lawson got on the track for the first time in this session and lined up eighth following his first fast attempt on the medium tires. By this time the Red Bull pitted for the softs and topped the standings. Later, Antonelli pitted too and beat both Verstappen’s and Hadjar’s times.
In the middle of the session Lando Norris pitted for the softs, too and lined up second behind Antonelli. Norris’ teammate also got on the track by this time and he lined up eleventh with the medium tires on. With 23 minutes remaining Piastri pitted for the softs and he got on the sixth place.
After a couple of minutes Pierre Gasly’s lap time got deleted because of track limits violation in Turn 4. He was also the only one who remained on the medium tires. With 15 minutes remaining the drivers were still on the track collecting data for their teams, but the standings didn’t change much. Antonelli was still on the top with Norris, Verstappen, Hamilton and Hadjar behind.
By this time there was a yellow flag followed by the red flag as Pierre Gasly crashed in Turn 13. He eventually got the car going but later he had to stop on the track. Two minutes before the end the session was resumed and all cars went out but the standings didn’t change. Antonelli remained on top with Norris, Verstappen, Hamilton and Hadjar behind.
