McLaren’s Lando Norris has topped first practice at Formula 1’s Spanish Grand Prix, heading Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton in Barcelona.
Friday’s first free practice session in hot conditions was used as a testing ground for a brace of upgrades across most of the teams, as well as the first session in which teams ran stiffer front wings to comply with the FIA’s latest technical directive.
As such, the first half hour of the session was largely run on Pirelli’s hardest C1 compound as teams completed correlation work to trial their new parts and match them with existing simulation data.
Teams also tested steel skid blocks in a bid to find solutions to the grass fires which plagued April’s Japanese Grand Prix, and were believed to be caused by hot sparks coming off the existing titanium skids.
In order to gather data, one car per team trialled the steel skids on Friday, which are believed to be 750 grams heavier and wear quicker.
Home hero Fernando Alonso led the early running on hards before McLaren’s Norris took over. But times started becoming more representative after the halfway mark, as evidenced by Sauber driver Nico Hulkenberg temporarily taking second.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images via Getty Images
On soft tyres Charles Leclerc took top before being overhauled by Red Bull’s Verstappen and then Norris, whose time of 1m13.718s was over three tenths clear of the world champion’s lap.
Hamilton was third ahead of Ferrari team-mate as the Scuderia trialled substantial updates, with the second McLaren of Oscar Piastri in fifth.
Liam Lawson continued Racing Bull’s competitive trajectory with sixth ahead of Haas man Oliver Bearman and his team-mate Isack Hadjar. Red Bull’s Yuki Tsunoda and Alpine driver Pierre Gasly completed the top 10.
The one-hour opening session ran without major incidents, with Haas stand-in Ryo Hirakawa taking a gravel trip excursion on the latest FP1 outing for Toyota’s WEC driver, this time instead of Esteban Ocon.
The other reserve driver on FP1 duties was F2 frontrunner Victor Martins, who took over Alex Albon‘s Williams for the session.
F1 Spanish GP – FP1 results
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Filip Cleeren
Formula 1
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