First part of free practice
Cloudy. Dry. Air +17C, rail +29C
The forecast promised rain on Friday, but the first practice session took place on a dry track. Many teams brought novelties and devoted a session to evaluating their effectiveness. Piastri, Sargent and de Vries had not competed in the Australian Grand Prix before and were getting used to the track. The stands were already full on Friday!
Due to problems with the machine, Norris was unable to get started right away. After 11 minutes, Magnussen crashed into the gravel in turn 3 and slowly made his way back to the pits, thwarting several drivers on the fast lap. After relegation, Pérez aborted the attempt on the Soft. In the 33rd minute, Tsunoda crashed in turn one, flew sideways through a gravel trap and nearly crashed into the barrier, but eventually managed to make it to the pits.
In the 37th minute, the session was stopped with red flags due to the failure of the GPS system – the teams lost the ability to warn drivers of fast cars in the vicinity, some literally stopped on the track, almost leading to an accident, but nothing happened. The system was quickly restored, the riders lost just under ten minutes.
In the 54th minute, Verstappen turned over after the curb attack, the set of tires was damaged, Max returned to the pits. On 56, Sargent’s car stalled on the grass exiting turn 12 due to power plant blackouts – and the red flags reappeared.
It was not possible to promptly evacuate Sargent’s car, it was decided not to resume the session. Verstappen took the lead with a lap time of 1:18.790 and almost half a second ahead of Hamilton in second fastest.
Results of the first session
| Pilot | Team | Time | Difference | Circles |
| 1. M. Verstappen | Red Bull | 1:18,790 | – | 17 |
| 2. L. Hamilton | Mercedes | 1:19,223 | +0.433 | 20 |
| 3. C. Perez | Red Bull | 1:19,293 | +0.503 | 19 |
| 4. F. Alonso | Aston Martin | 1:19,317 | +0.527 | 23 |
| 5. Sch.Lecler | Ferrari | 1:19,378 | +0.588 | 16 |
| 6. K. Sainz | Ferrari | 1:19,505 | +0.715 | 20 |
| 7. L. Norris | McLaren | 1:19,536 | +0.746 | 16 |
| 8.P Gasly | Alps | 1:19,646 | +0.856 | 22 |
| 9.D Russell | Mercedes | 1:19,699 | +0.909 | 23 |
| 10. L. Walk | Aston Martin | 1:19,766 | +0.976 | 19 |
| 11. A. Albon | Willems | 1:19,766 | +0.976 | 21 |
| 12. O. Piastri | McLaren | 1:19,777 | +0.987 | 22 |
| 13. N. Hulkenberg | hare | 1:19,806 | +1,016 | 19 |
| 14.N. deVries | AlphaTauri | 1:19,933 | +1,143 | 25 |
| 15. L. Sargent | Willems | 1:20.074 | +1,284 | 21 |
| 16. E. Okon | Alps | 1:20.175 | +1,385 | 20 |
| 17. Y. Tsunoda | AlphaTauri | 1:20.399 | +1,609 | 14 |
| 18. V. Bottas | Alfa Romeo | 1:20,419 | +1,629 | 21 |
| 19.G Zhou | Alfa Romeo | 1:20,569 | +1,779 | 22 |
| 20. K. Magnussen | hare | 1:21,147 | +2,357 | 17 |
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
