AUSTRALIAN GP – Max Verstappen fastest by four-tenths in first practice ahead of Lewis Hamilton
Max Verstappen was the fastest in first practice ahead of this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix. The Red Bull driver set a 18.705 putting himself four-tenths ahead of Lewis Hamilton, who jumped into second to spilt Red Bulls after going seven-tenths faster than Sergio Perez.
The opening session in Albert Park proved to be chaotic and was interrupted by two red flags, the second of which brought the session to an early close. Verstappen’s teammate Perez still looked to be the closest challenger going into this weekend.
Verstappen’s session was not smooth, as he regularly missed the Brabham apex and at one point had to catch a big oversteer snap going through the quickly following Jones, (Turns One and Two)
In the closing stages, he climbed too far over the Turn Four exit kerbs, while pushing on well-used softs, and spun off sideways, at the same spot where Sebastian Vettel crashed his Aston in the 2022 race here last year after making a similar mistake.
Ahead of this weekend they are separated by just one point in the drivers’ standings, and appeared tightly matched in Melbourne as they exchanged fastest lap times mid-way through the opening session, before Verstappen pulled almost exactly half a second clear with an 18.790.
However, Verstappen’s time was set on the soft tyre while Perez was on the medium which suggests that the times will be closer once adjusted for tyre compound. Hamilton meanwhile moved up the times late in the session after struggling early on with the handling of the car.
Fernando Alonso was fourth however his best time was set on the medium tyre, the Aston Martin driver having to abort his run on the soft tyre after making a mistake on his soft tyre run. That put the Spaniard ahead of the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc by nearly four hundredths. Alonso’s time was almost exactly a tenth slower than the mark Verstappen had set earlier.
Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz was a tenth behind, in a chaotic afternoon session. The conditions were windy as shown by Hamilton along Lakeside Drive and then having a huge snap of oversteer into Turn Eleven.
It was a much-improved start for McLaren, Lando Norris going seventh three hundredths behind Alonso and three-quarters of a second off the outright pace. That shows the team are making progress although they went into the weekend targeting Baku for a step forwards.
Norris had the start of the session was hampered by a aero sensor issue, but other issues towards the end of the session prevented others from improving.
Pierre Gasly was a tenth behind the Englishmen with him going five hundredths faster than the second Mercedes of George Russell, with Lance Stroll and Alex Albon setting identical lap times in tenth and eleventh. Oscar Piastri’s first home race saw him go twelfth in first practice just under a second off the outright pace.
That put the Victorian twelfth fastest three hundredths ahead of Nico Hulkenberg. Nyck de Vries was fourteenth with Logan Sargeant fifteenth
The session had to be red flagged halfway through because of a failure of the GPS system teams use to monitor where cars are on the circuit and at what speed they are travelling.
This resulted in several near misses towards the end of the session, with teams being unable to inform them of other cars approaching with big speed differences.
This led to a nine-minute red flag, with a second stoppage following in the closing minutes as Sargeant stopped his Williams at the exit of Turn Eleven due to a suspected electric issue. The American was sixteenth going a tenth ahead of Esteban Ocon.