FP1: Leclerc heads Norris and Sainz in opening Singapore practice
Charles Leclerc continued his recent impressive form, topping the opening practice session at the Singapore Grand Prix. F1Technical's lead journalist Balazs Szabo reports on Free Practice 1.
While F1 raced in Baku last weekend, the field has now made the long trip from Azerbaijan to the Marina Bay Circuit for the Singapore Grand Prix.
The two venues are around seven thousand kilometres separated which saw the F1 field tackle another logistical challenge of this very long season, moving personnel, cars and equipment in a matter of a couple of days from the shores of the Caspian Sea to the city-state where the Malacca Straights meet the South China Sea.
For the 15th running of the Singapore Grand Prix, Formula One's tyre supplier Pirelli has chosen the same compounds as last year: C3 as Hard, C4 as Medium and C5 as Soft. In fact, this tyre selection is the same as at the past two races at Monza and Baku, although those circuits feature very different characteristics.
The opening one-hour session saw the field use all three compounds, with some drivers using the hard compound during their first run before switching to the softs while the other opted for the duo of medium and soft.
Charles Leclerc set the pace on his third time lap on the red-walled tyres, posting a time of 1m31.763s. McLaren's Lando Norris finished second, just under a tenth of a second adrift of the Monegasque, with Ferrari's Spanish driver Carlos Sainz taking third.
Reigning champion struggled for pace at Singapore last year, and he complained about the understeery behaviour of his RB20, but he looked fairly quick in the opening practice. The Dutchman racked up a total of 22 laps, with his quickest one promoting him to P4 on the leaderboard.
RB had a very encouraging session, with Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo taking fifth and seventh. Baku race winner Oscar Piastri had a brush with the wall in the latter stages, picking up some damage to his wheel hubcap, with his best lap enough for a sixth place on the timesheets.
On the back of a strong weekend for Williams in Baku, Alexander Albon finished in P8, with Fernando Alonso and Alpine’s Esteban Ocon rounding out the top 10.
Having taken his first points a few days ago in Baku, Franco Colapinto took P11 in his third F1 race weekend, ahead of the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton in P12 and Pierre Gasly in P13 for Alpine. Perez went 14th quickest, having complained about struggling to turn his Red Bull during his final laps.
Aston Martin's Lance Stroll looked strong on the hards, but he finished down in P15 after the soft-tyre runs while George Russell was down in P16.
Having missed the previous Baku round, Kevin Magnussen returned to action, putting his Haas in P17 in front of the Kick Sauber pair of Bottas and Zhou Guanyu, leaving Nico Hulkenberg to bring up the rear in P20.
