FP1: Verstappen heads Piastri in sole practice at the Red Bull Ring

F1 Grand Prix, GP Austria, Red Bull Ring

Championship runaway leader Max Verstappen set the benchmark in the sole one-hour practice session at the Austrian Grand Prix. F1Technical's lead journalist Balazs Szabo reports on Free Practice 1 from the Red Bull Ring.

The results indicate that reigning world champion Max Verstappen had a perfect start to his Austrian Grand Prix, albeit he had issues to overcome in the opening session. The Dutchman had a minor engine failure in the middle part of the session.

The Red Bull driver’s RB20 conked out at the bottom of the hill on the run up to Turn 1, but he was able to roll his RB20 back to marshals, who pushed him back into the pitlane under a red flag. Verstappen then went on to set the benchmark time with a 1m05.685s on Pirelli's soft tyres.

Ferrari appeared to lack pace in the opening part of the session, but Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz took third and fourth respectively.

Lewis Hamilton ended the session in P5 after having led the field before the qualifying simulation runs. The Briton refused to use the soft compound, and spent the last segment of the session by completing a race simulation run on Pirelli’s hard compound.

His team-mate George Russell also looked mighty strong on the hards, but he aborted his flying lap on the red-walled tyres, and ended up 8th.

McLaren had a quite session. Having struggled for pace at Barcelona a week ago, Oscar Piastri is in top form again as he ended
the session second, three tenths of a second behind Verstappen.

His team-mate Lando Norris was on course to challenge Verstappen’s time on his qualifying simulation lap, but he made a mistake in Sector 2, and was unable to improve his previous best lap that he set on the white-banded hards.

Esteban Ocon set the sixth quickest lap, confirming Alpine’s improvements in recent races. His team-mate Pierre Gasly was four tenths of a second slower, and ended the session five places behind.

Sergio Perez looked strong on the hard compound, but he could not nail his qualifying simulation lap on the C5 tyres, and ended the sole practice in P12.