Spanish Grand Prix Friday Round-up: Mercedes Reign Supreme

Friday saw the first on-track action of the Spanish Grand Prix with Free Practice 1 and 2. It’s the first time this year the drivers will drive on the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya since pre-season testing was moved to Bahrain. 

Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team dominated with their drivers topping both sessions. Valtteri Bottas topped the morning, beating Max Verstappen by just 0.033 seconds. Lewis Hamilton brought his car home in third. It was Hamilton’s turn to top the timings in the afternoon, going nearly four tenths of a second faster than Bottas’ morning time. Bottas completed a one-two in second place with Scuderia Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc completing the top three.

Red Bull Racing seemed to be struggling on the opening day. Despite Verstappen coming second during the morning session, he wasn’t able to come any higher than ninth in the afternoon. Sergio Pérez found himself in mid-table. He came ninth and tenth respectively. Red Bull will be hoping they can compete come Saturday.

McLaren F1 Team have been the underdogs so far this year, with both their drivers scoring points at every race. However, Daniel Ricciardo wasn’t able to break into the top ten in either of the sessions with finishes of fourteenth and fifteenth respectively. 

Lando Norris has been having better luck; His morning session saw him put in a fastest time placing him fourth overall, while his second session saw him finish twelfth overall. 

Charles Leclerc has visibly improved in 2021 after a poor 2020 season for him. He found himself inside the top five in both sessions, claiming fifth in the first and climbing to third for the afternoon’s running.

Scuderia Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz Jr. still isn’t on the same pace as Leclerc, but he isn’t too far behind him. With a sixth and eighth place finish respectively, he’s looking on top form for his home grand prix.

Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda have started off their weekend in a strong position. Pierre Gasly claimed seventh and sixth respectively, continuing on his fine pace he’s had of recent. 

Yuki Tsunoda has been the standout of the 2021 rookies and continued on to impress. He wasn’t able to do any better than eleventh in the first session but pulled out a lap in the afternoon that placed him just half a second behind Hamilton in seventh. He suffered a small technical issue when his car lost power halfway through the session but that didn’t mar his running.

Alpine F1 Team looked a liked two completely different teams. During the morning’s session, Esteban Ocon finished twelfth and Fernando Alonso even further down in fifteenth. The duo put on their racing boots for the afternoon, putting both drivers in the top half with Ocon in fourth and Alonso just behind him in fifth.

Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team floated around mid-table all day. Sebastian Vettel came eighth with Lance Stroll in tenth during the mornings running. They weren’t able to improve in the afternoon and even fell further down the grid with an eleventh from Vettel and Stroll coming in fourteenth.

Kimi Räikkönen sat out the first practice of the day, lending his car to Robert Kubica. Kubica’s had some good pace but his session was marred when he beached his car in the gravel after Turn 10, causing the session to be red flagged. He finished nineteenth overall.

Räikkönen jumped back into the car for the afternoon. His best time was only a second off Hamilton’s but with most of the grid bunched up, this only got him sixteenth fastest.

Teammate Antonio Giovinazzi finished thirteenth in both sessions, a strong days running for the Italian driver.

Roy Nissany took George Russell’s Williams Racing car out for the morning session. He came a respectable seventeenth. Russell jumped back into his car for the afternoon, but ‘Mr Saturday’ didn’t charge the grid and came seventeenth overall.

Nicholas Latifi sixteenth in the early session. He unfortunately wasn’t able to repeat this result, falling down the grid to eighteenth in the afternoon.

Nikita Mazepin found himself in the middle of a few incidents once again. During the morning session, he spun at Turn 7 and also got in the way of Leclerc’s flying lap making the latter say ‘Mazepin will never change’ on his radio. During the afternoon session, Mazepin’s car was released from the pits into the path of Räikköne, leaving the Finn to swerve out of the way to avoid a collision. Mazepin finished bottom in both sessions in twentieth. 

His Uralkali Haas F1 Team teammate Mick Schumacher had a quiet day. He came eighteenth and nineteenth respectively. 

Free Practice 1 results

Pos	NO	Driver	Nat.	Team	Time	Gap	Laps
1	77	Valtteri Bottas	FIN	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:18.504		25
2	33	Max Verstappen	NED	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:18.537	+0.033s	19
3	44	Lewis Hamilton	GBR	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:18.627	+0.123s	22
4	4	Lando Norris	GBR	McLaren F1 Team	1:18.944	+0.440s	24
5	16	Charles Leclerc	MON	Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow	1:18.996	+0.492s	25
6	55	Carlos Sainz Jr.	ESP	Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow	1:19.020	+0.516s	22
7	10	Pierre Gasly	FRA	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:19.062	+0.558s	26
8	5	Sebastian Vettel	GER	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:19.234	+0.730s	24
9	11	Sergio Pérez	MEX	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:19.349	+0.845s	17
10	18	Lance Stroll	CAN	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:19.429	+0.925s	25
11	22	Yuki Tsunoda	JAP	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:19.669	+1.165s	22
12	31	Esteban Ocon	FRA	Alpine F1 Team	1:19.681	+1.177s	25
13	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	ITA	Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen	1:19.694	+1.190s	23
14	3	Daniel Ricciardo	AUS	McLaren F1 Team	1:19.732	+1.228s	24
15	14	Fernando Alonso	ESP	Alpine F1 Team	1:19.950	+1.446s	25
16	6	Nicholas Latifi	CAN	Williams Racing	1:20.270	+1.766s	25
17	45	Roy Nissany	ISR	Williams Racing	1:20.700	+2.196s	23
18	47	Mick Schumacher	GER	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:20.766	+2.262s	23
19	88	Robert Kubica	POL	Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen	1:21.887	+3.383s	13
20	9	Nikita Mazepin	RUS	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:21.976	+3.472s	22

Free Practice 2 results

Pos	NO	Driver	Nat.	Team	Time	Gap	Laps
1	44	Lewis Hamilton	GBR	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:18.170		32
2	77	Valtteri Bottas	FIN	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:18.309	+0.139s	31
3	16	Charles Leclerc	MON	Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow	1:18.335	+0.165s	28
4	31	Esteban Ocon	FRA	Alpine F1 Team	1:18.466	+0.296s	29
5	14	Fernando Alonso	ESP	Alpine F1 Team	1:18.518	+0.348s	30
6	10	Pierre Gasly	FRA	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:18.593	+0.423s	32
7	22	Yuki Tsunoda	JAP	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:18.619	+0.449s	30
8	55	Carlos Sainz Jr.	ESP	Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow	1:18.674	+0.504s	30
9	33	Max Verstappen	NED	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:18.785	+0.615s	26
10	11	Sergio Pérez	MEX	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:18.918	+0.748s	23
11	5	Sebastian Vettel	GER	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:18.947	+0.777s	30
12	4	Lando Norris	GBR	McLaren F1 Team	1:19.092	+0.922s	28
13	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	ITA	Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen	1:19.122	+0.952s	29
14	18	Lance Stroll	CAN	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:19.134	+0.964s	29
15	3	Daniel Ricciardo	AUS	McLaren F1 Team	1:19.195	+1.025s	28
16	7	Kimi Räikkönen	FIN	Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen	1:19.213	+1.043s	30
17	63	George Russell	GBR	Williams Racing	1:19.957	+1.787s	29
18	6	Nicholas Latifi	CAN	Williams Racing	1:20.046	+1.876s	26
19	47	Mick Schumacher	GER	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:20.326	+2.156s	30
20	9	Nikita Mazepin	RUS	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:20.753	+2.583s	27