Valtteri Bottas led the field at the start of the second one-hour training session on Friday, although he immediately pitted at the end of his first lap, and remained there for the next 20 minutes while Alfa Romeo was working on his car.
This meant that Bottas’ teammate Zhou Guanyu set the first benchmark in 1m20.145s, which was quickly overtaken by Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll, the first to be left behind. Kevin Magnussen’s way out of Aston Martin’s garage. at the beginning of the session.
This forced the Haas driver to lock the wheels because he avoided hitting Vettel in the pitlane in an incident that will be investigated now that FP2 has ended.
Esteban Ocon’s first soft lap reduced the fastest time to 1m16.842s moments after Aston’s pair arrived, just before Verstappen’s initial effort – Red Bull using the media as he did. most of the field at this stage-. put it faster in a 1m15.618s.
Verstappen’s initial race lasted 10 laps, with each steering wheel after a cooling lap which brought him additional gains as he improved to 1m15.096s, then 1m14.792s and finally 1m14.532s when the first ones finished. 15 minutes.
Then, the world champion passed the next phase of the pit session, during which Leclerc closed in 0.298 seconds in second place with a series of laps flying in an equally long course, but instead using the soft ones.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari F1-75
Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images
Just before halfway, Verstappen came out for the first time on the red-walled C5 rubber and set a new best time: 1m14.127s.
Just behind the other Red Bull and on the same premises, Sergio Pérez, who had had a lock on the fork and then a moment off the track in the first laps during the first stages, made a classification simulation effort that went to arrive. in just over a second slower than Verstappen’s lead time.
The next to try a classification simulation effort was Leclerc and set the fastest time in the middle sector to improve the second best time to 0.081 seconds at the drift of Verstappen.
Sainz finished third shortly after with a 1m14.352s, while Vettel’s own steering wheel in the soft placed fourth, 0.315s behind the leader, with the pair noticed by the race director for an incident involving driving unnecessarily slowly to the front pit. of their respective classification simulations.
The group then moved on to collecting long-distance race data, with heavy clouds piling up around the track and threatening the action at the end of the session, although no rain fell.
So this was blocked in the rest of the top 10, as Fernando Alonso was fifth ahead of AlphaTauri of Pierre Gasly and George Russell, who, along with teammate Lewis Hamilton, lost the first part of the FP2 while Mercedes continued to work on adjusting their W13s. past login.
Russell complained of “massive jumps” on the fast turn 9 to the right that leads to the short straight that goes down to the fork during the early stages, ahead of his best time in the soft – a 1m14.971s – arriving during the gust of the fastest times. just past halfway.
Carlos Sainz, Ferrari F1-75
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo finished eighth and ninth, with the long run of the last session of the latter with a near error with Zhou in the approach to the 3/4 turn of the Turns: the Alpha driver apparently did not I knew McLaren was on a hot lap.
Ocon completed the top 10 ahead of Perez, Stroll and Hamilton.
The seven-time world champion ended up losing the first 15 minutes due to lengthy setup adjustments, with his best time reaching 0.45 seconds slower than Russell’s fastest on the other Mercedes.
Hamilton described driving his car as “now impossible to drive” during the closing stages.
Bottas finally climbed to the back of the field with no time set and only three laps of exit / entry completed, as both times the Finn came out again after his initial exploratory lap, a problem with his gear changes. he was forced to return to the track. Alpha garage.
The FP2 was interrupted by a brief activation of a virtual security car during the early stages, as a marshal had to run to the track at the exit of the fork to retrieve a can of drinks that was pulling down the track in stormy conditions, a feature throughout the session.