The Friday in F1 Las Vegas GP saw Mercedes surprise the pack with good pace when drivers had troubles with braking point in cold conditions.
It was slippery conditions on Friday in F1 Las Vegas GP but it didn’t cause any major incidents apart from drivers struggling to find braking points at certain corners. The surprise came via Mercedes pair where Lewis Hamilton ended up on top in both the sessions.
His teammate George Russell ended up second and third. Both were surprised by the pace shown by Mercedes and hope that they can carry it forward when it matters as they feel that their rivals will pick up pace as the weekend progresses, which has happened before.
The Ferrari pair of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz felt good too, but only had hiccup in generating heat in the tyres quickly. They are wary of the competition around from Mercedes and McLaren, where Lando Norris didn’t feel good in the high fuel running as opposed to low fuel.
His teammate Oscar Piastri felt reasonable despite not setting the timing sheet alive. While the three F1 teams were close to each other, the same couldn’t be said about Red Bull, who ended up out of sync, especially after not completing a soft tyre run in the FP2 session.
As per Helmut Marko, Red Bull mistakenly brought the wrong rear wing to the grand prix and that the Las Vegas-spec is mostly to arrive on Saturday. Both Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez felt okay with their long run pace, but struggled to get the tyres to work in qualifying trim.
Hamilton: “I mean that’s the first time I’ve had a day like that this year so. The car was feeling generally good in FP1, in FP2 less so. Difficult to know exactly where we are or why we are where we are but really enjoying driving the track and I think we’ll see whether the car is the same tomorrow. The race pace is not that great so the work we have to do overnight is to figure out how to have better race pace without losing actual pace throughout the lap. But it was nice to get like consecutive sectors, and the car not throwing me off which was nice.”
Verstappen: “Yeah, [it was] slippery. I think we struggled a lot with making the tyres work, over one lap especially. The long run I think started off a bit more competitive, but even there I think we need to fine-tune a few things. The one-lap pace is quite far off. Of course, it’s quite unique conditions around here and it’s very cold, but at the end of the day it’s the same for everyone, so we need to try and understand what we’re doing wrong at the moment. I mean, for me it just feels massively tyre-related. The balance of the car is not even that wrong, I think, it’s just we have no grip – it’s like driving on ice at the moment.”
Norris: “I think the low fuel stuff’s been ok. The high fuel I was shocking. Plenty of things to look into – these kinds of combinations of things and what we struggle with, with the front graining and stuff… I’m just not very good at it. It’s always a bit of a struggle for me but a good amount of time to work on it. Two halves really – good low fuel and difficult high fuel. It’s just very difficult, super low grip. I feel like I could drive a road car quicker than we drive at the minute. Mixed feelings. It can be. If I knew it, I’d probably do it! But even if I know it, it’s still not an easy thing for me to go and do because it’s a struggle for me always. I’ll look into it and see what I can work on. At least I can focus more on probably the high fuel than the low fuel for now. Obviously qualifying and qualifying well, and qualifying at the front, will always help everything else. Plenty of things to look into tonight.”
Leclerc: “We’ve got to try and find something to try and turn the situation around, but we’re not so far [away]. All in all I think we are very strong in race pace, a bit less in quali. It’s been a bit the story of our season but it’s better that way than the opposite. I think we have some ideas of what to do to try and improve that, but then it’s a compromise of how good you want to be in the race compared to qualifying and we need to find the right compromise.”
The Top 10 saw several drivers from the midfield making rounds which included Alpine’s Pierre Gasly in both FP1 and FP2 sessions. The Frenchman felt good on qualifying pace, but struggled with graining on high fuel, as Esteban Ocon had similar thoughts just outside the Top 10.
The Alpine had close competition from Haas’ Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg. The Dane looked slightly better than the German, but both were close in contention to be in the Top 10. It was day of havles for Visa Cash App RB pair of Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson.
The Japanese driver found pace in FP2 to be in the Top 10, where the Kiwi too felt slightly better after both had struggles in FP1. There was positive chorus at Kick Sauber too especially on the Valtteri Bottas’ side, who felt good the updates, whereas Zhou Guanyu had a decent outing too.
Things at Aston Martin looked bleak as both Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll trialed various set-ups to get the correct one for the rest of the F1 weekend. Williams’ Franco Colapinto had a tough run, while Alexander Albon’s day was cut short due to fuel system issue.
Gasly: “It’s great to be back in Las Vegas at this really unique venue for Formula 1. Track conditions were difficult to begin with, as expected, with low grip and a lot of sliding. I felt quite good straight away in the car and we seemed competitive right from Free Practice 1. We ended sixth place in Free Practice 2 so we are in the mix and we know our targets – Haas and RB – were also competitive. We must keep working hard tonight as the long run on high fuel was more challenging with tyre graining. The midfield is close where a tenth of a second can change a lot of things. We remain optimistic to be in the mix but Qualifying is one thing, the Race is another, and we must get on top of a few areas if we are to come away with a good result.”
Magnussen: “It’s been looking good. Like the last few races, it’s been a strong start, and the car is looking good. It’s a strange track as the surface is super slippery and you’re sliding around and graining your tires, so the track is evolving every lap and you’re gaining seconds each time. It’s hard to feel super confident as it’s clear it could change around quite a bit, but it’s a good place to build for tomorrow.”
Tsunoda: “Overall, it was a positive first day here in Las Vegas. We struggled a bit in FP1, but then we managed to turn it around later in FP2. It’s a positive sign, as usually it’s not an easy thing to do, and I think we’ve found the direction to follow for the rest of the weekend. We need some more finetuning for tomorrow to find a couple of tenths to try and get into Q3. The long runs also seemed positive, even if I think it depends a lot on how we’re able to manage the tyres, given the tricky and unusual conditions we have here, but will be important to find the right balance in terms of car setup between short and long runs.”
Alonso: “It wasn’t easy out there with very cold temperatures tonight making it difficult to keep the tyres in the right window. We tried a few different car setup philosophies in both sessions. We have some work to do overnight to find more performance ahead of tomorrow.”
Albon: “We’re certainly lacking mileage today and around this track, getting those laps in is vital as it’s so tricky and you need to feel confident with everything, especially your braking confidence. We’ll be able to fix the issue, but we certainly have a lot of work to do tomorrow in FP3. We need to look at our performance and see where we can improve but it will be about getting those tyres in the right window, and we’re not quite there yet.”
Bottas: “The upgrades we brought this weekend seem to be functioning as expected, which is a good sign indicating that we’ve made a step forward with the performance of the car. While it’s always difficult to say exactly where we’ll stand tomorrow, we don’t seem to be in too bad a position compared to the most recent events. Of course, the five-place grid penalty is a setback, but we’ll do everything we can in qualifying to be as far high in the standings as we can. Now, the focus shifts to finding more single-lap performance to improve our qualifying performance, while also working to strengthen our race pace, which has been an area of weakness for us recently.”
Here’s how FP1 in F1 Las Vegas GP panned out
Here’s how FP2 in F1 Las Vegas GP panned out
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