Max Verstappen was fastest in an overcast first practice session for the Japanese Grand Prix the three-time world champion set a 30.056 on the soft tyres going just under two-tenths faster than Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez. Red Bull hoping to return to dominant ways having retired from the race in Melbourne.
The Red Bull driver followed the red flag- brought out by Logan Sargeant’s crash, with a hot lap on soft tyres to throw down the gauntlet for the rest of the weekend. The American driver not helping Williams who are short of spares after teammate Alex Albon wrote off his car in FP1 in Melbourne.
Sargeant washed out through the Dunlop Curve and spun over the gravel. This did little to stop him from hitting the wall with the front of his car, which rotated it rearwards. That caused extensive damage to the front suspension, gearbox and nose, although the chassis was not damaged, much to the team’s relief.
Williams will need to assess Sargeant’s car for damage, which was the car Albon crashed in Melbourne and required chassis repairs. The Grove team is still awaiting completion of a spare tub, which it does not expect to have until Miami.
Carlos Sainz was third the Ferrari driver going three hundredths behind Perez and over a quarter of a second ahead of the Mercedes, the Melbourne winner hoping again he can take the fight to Red Bull. Sainz who is fighting for his future having been replaced by Lewis Hamilton for 2025, he was a quarter of a second ahead of George Russell with Hamilton just over a hundredth further behind.
Charles Leclerc put his Ferrari sixth a hundredth and a half behind his future teammate. Fernando Alonso, running an older spec Aston Martin was seventh as his teammate Lance Stroll trialled the slightly revised sidepods on his machinery. However, their back-to-back testing hit a snag as an aero rake broke on Stroll’s car early on in the session.
The first major upgrades since Bahrain have begun to filter through ahead of two sprint weekends in Shanghai and Miami. Most noticeable are Red Bull and Aston Martin, both of whom have revised aerodynamics, particularly around the floor.
Oscar Piastri was eighth fastest going six hundredths faster than Yuki Tsunoda, who split the two McLarens with Lando Norris a hundredth behind the Japanese driver as the Englishman rounded out the top ten.
Esteban Ocon was eleventh as he went nearly a hundredth faster than Albon with Nico Hulkenberg thirteenth ahead of Valtteri Bottas and Lance Stroll.
Formula 2 driver Ayumu Iwasa was sixteenth, just under a second slower than Tsunoda, on a run-out in Daniel Ricciardo’s RB at his home event as part of his driver development programme for Red Bull. Iwasa was seven hundredths faster than Pierre Gasly
Alpine, Sauber and Haas’s of Pierre Gasly, Guanyu Zhou and Kevin Magnussen respectively, with Sargeant bringing up the rear as he watched from the sidelines following his crash. The Frenchman went over half a tenth faster than Zhou with the Chinese driver going a quarter of a second faster than the Haas.
