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Alex Kalinauckas

F1 Australian GP: Verstappen beats Hamilton but spins in FP1

Red Bull’s Verstappen set a quickest lap of 1m18.790s to end the session ahead of Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton, who jumped up the order late on after initially struggling with the handling of his W14. Hamilton had been adrift of his team-mate George Russell during the early exploratory laps on the harder tyres.

Sergio Perez took third in the second Red Bull ahead of Aston Martin driver Fernando Alonso, although the former’s best time was set on the mediums, as he went off track on his soft-tyred run.

Then came Ferrari pair Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz, who had an off-track moment midway through the session after the rear of his SF-23 snapped right running through the Turns 1-2 complex.  

Several drivers had similar issues, with AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda’s off the most dramatic as he spun and his AT04 bounced into the air after it hit the gravel trap in the runoff behind the left/right sequence.

Heavy wind gusted across the Albert Park track at this point all through FP1, which likely contributed to the many issues the drivers were having once they began to press on the soft compound tyres in early qualifying simulation runs.  

Lando Norris took seventh for McLaren ahead of Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, Russell and Lance Stroll, who rounded out the top 10 in the second Aston. Stroll was the only other leading car runner to set their personal best on the mediums.

Although he led the way, Verstappen’s session was not smooth, as he regularly missed the Turn 1 apex and at one point had to catch a big oversteer snap going through the quickly following Turn 2.

In the closing stages, he climbed too far over the Turn 4 exit kerbs, while pushing on well-used softs, and spun off sideways – at the same spot where Sebastian Vettel crashed his Aston in the 2022 race here last year after making a similar mistake.  

Just past the halfway point, the session was suspended when the GPS system used by the F1 organisation, the FIA and the teams went down. Several drivers had near misses due to their squads being unable to inform them of other cars approaching with big speed differences.

This led to a nine-minute red flag, with a second stoppage following in the closing minutes as Logan Sargeant stopped his Williams at the exit of Turn 11 due to a suspected electric issue.

Cla Driver Laps Time Gap Interval km/h
1 Netherlands Max Verstappen 17 1'18.790     241.157
2 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton 20 1'19.223 0.433 0.433 239.839
3 Mexico Sergio Perez 19 1'19.293 0.503 0.070 239.627
4 Spain Fernando Alonso 23 1'19.317 0.527 0.024 239.555
5 Monaco Charles Leclerc 16 1'19.378 0.588 0.061 239.371
6 Spain Carlos Sainz 20 1'19.505 0.715 0.127 238.988
7 United Kingdom Lando Norris 16 1'19.536 0.746 0.031 238.895
8 France Pierre Gasly 22 1'19.646 0.856 0.110 238.565
9 United Kingdom George Russell 23 1'19.699 0.909 0.053 238.407
10 Canada Lance Stroll 19 1'19.766 0.976 0.067 238.206
11 Thailand Alex Albon 21 1'19.766 0.976 0.000 238.206
12 Australia Oscar Piastri 22 1'19.777 0.987 0.011 238.173
13 Germany Nico Hulkenberg 19 1'19.806 1.016 0.029 238.087
14 Netherlands Nyck de Vries 25 1'19.933 1.143 0.127 237.709
15 United States Logan Sargeant 21 1'20.074 1.284 0.141 237.290
16 France Esteban Ocon 20 1'20.175 1.385 0.101 236.991
17 Japan Yuki Tsunoda 14 1'20.399 1.609 0.224 236.331
18 Finland Valtteri Bottas 21 1'20.419 1.629 0.020 236.272
19 China Zhou Guanyu 22 1'20.569 1.779 0.150 235.832
20 Denmark Kevin Magnussen 17 1'21.147 2.357 0.578 234.152
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