Leclerc Tops Opening Practice Session of Miami Grand Prix Weekend

Championship leader Charles Leclerc opened up the Miami Grand Prix weekend with the fastest time in first practice, the Monegasque racer edging out George Russell by just 0.071 seconds.

All twenty drivers took to the Miami International Autodrome to get first laps under their belts on Friday morning, with Williams Racing’s Nicholas Latifi the first driver to exit the pit lane once the green light was illuminated.

Everyone went out early and did multiple laps to understand the newest track on the Formula 1 calendar, although Mick Schumacher was late out for the Haas F1 Team.  And as drivers became acclimatised to the track, lap times began to tumble.

But come the end of the session, Leclerc was at the top of the timesheets, the Scuderia Ferrari driver posting a time of 1:31.098 to beat Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team’s Russell by under a tenth of a second.

Mercedes are trialling out a new front and rear wing this weekend in a bid to fix the issues they’ve had with porpoising so far in 2022, and the fix appears to be a step in the right direction, although both Russell and team-mate Lewis Hamilton were still noticeably bouncing down the straights.

Max Verstappen ended third fastest for Oracle Red Bull Racing, but the Dutchman completed only fourteen laps as the team battled to solve an overheating problem with his car.  His team-mate Sergio Pérez did not have the same kind of problems, with the Mexican ending fourth, just 0.024 seconds back on the Dutchman.

Pierre Gasly was an encouraging fifth for Scuderia AlphaTauri, just ahead of the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz Jr.  The Spaniard suffered a high speed spin at turn four late in the session but was able to keep the car out of the barriers.

Alexander Albon was an excellent seventh for Williams ahead of Hamilton, Haas’ Kevin Magnussen and McLaren F1 Team’s Daniel Ricciardo.

The second McLaren of Lando Norris ended eleventh ahead of BWT Alpine F1 Team’s Fernando Alonso, while Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN’s Zhou Guanyu edged out Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team’s Sebastian Vettel for thirteenth.  Alpine’s Esteban Ocon and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll finished fifteenth and sixteenth respectively.

There was one red flag during the session, with Valtteri Bottas crashing his Alfa Romeo car into the barriers at the long turn seven/eight sequence, the Finn damaging the rear of the car on impact.

As a result of the crash, Bottas completed only thirteen laps of the Miami street track and ended down in seventeenth position in the order, ahead only of AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, Haas’ Schumacher and Williams’ Latifi.

Miami International Autodrome Free Practice 1 Result

POS	NO.	DRIVER	NAT	TEAM	TIME	GAP	LAPS
1	16	Charles Leclerc	MON	Scuderia Ferrari	1:31.098		26
2	63	George Russell	GBR	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:31.169	+0.071	23
3	1	Max Verstappen	NED	Oracle Red Bull Racing	1:31.277	+0.179	14
4	11	Sergio Pérez	MEX	Oracle Red Bull Racing	1:31.301	+0.203	22
5	10	Pierre Gasly	FRA	Scuderia AlphaTauri	1:31.498	+0.400	27
6	55	Carlos Sainz Jr.	ESP	Scuderia Ferrari	1:31.528	+0.430	25
7	23	Alexander Albon	THA	Williams Racing	1:31.854	+0.756	20
8	44	Lewis Hamilton	GBR	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:31.956	+0.858	23
9	20	Kevin Magnussen	DEN	Haas F1 Team	1:32.559	+1.461	20
10	3	Daniel Ricciardo	AUS	McLaren F1 Team	1:32.592	+1.494	21
11	4	Lando Norris	GBR	McLaren F1 Team	1:32.615	+1.517	26
12	14	Fernando Alonso	ESP	BWT Alpine F1 Team	1:32.884	+1.786	31
13	24	Zhou Guanyu	CHN	Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN	1:33.020	+1.922	23
14	5	Sebastian Vettel	GER	Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team	1:33.024	+1.926	24
15	31	Esteban Ocon	FRA	BWT Alpine F1 Team	1:33.417	+2.319	27
16	18	Lance Stroll	CAN	Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team	1:33.576	+2.478	23
17	77	Valtteri Bottas	FIN	Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN	1:33.773	+2.675	13
18	22	Yuki Tsunoda	JAP	Scuderia AlphaTauri	1:34.043	+2.945	27
19	47	Mick Schumacher	GER	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:34.945	+3.847	20
20	6	Nicholas Latifi	CAN	Williams Racing	1:35.637	+4.539	27