FP1 Report | Sainz leads Ferrari 1-2 as top 5 split by 0.15

The prancing horse of Ferrari finsihed the session on top with a 1-2 as Carlos Sainz led Charles Leclerc. While the World Consturctors Champions Red Bull had Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen following in third and fourth respectievly despite setting the exact same time. With Lewis Hamilton in fifth trailing by around one and half tenths.

Although a regular finishing positions for Ferrari at the end of the FP1 session, it wasn't like that the whole time. Sainz seemed a fair amount slower on the hard tyre than his Red Bull counterpart (who were 1-2 after the first third) while Leclerc didn't set a lap time for the first 20 minutes of the session. This was quickly overturned as by the end of the first soft trye run of the session it was a Ferrari 1-2 as the Spaniard led the Monagasque.

It was Nyck De Vries, Liam Lawson, Jack Doohan, Logan Sargeant, and Pietro Fittipaldi who all took part in the FP1 session today, which meant that a quater of the grid were rookies. Lawson and Sargeant didn't have that great of a start to the session. As the American ran wide, and the Kiwi lost his brakes before setting a lap. However the biggest issue for a rookie was that of Fittipaldi and Lawson, who both had their cars stopped on track, as Fittipaldi's engine went up in smoke, while Lawson seemed to have a brake fire and a engine issue, both brough out the red flag. Lawson's was one to end the session as their were just three minutes remaining.

This is something that Steiner has said will probably force them to take a grid penalty for Sunday's race, which will affect Kevin Magnussen's starting position despite not being behind the wheel of the car.

Should also be noted the rookies all running in the bottom five are not neccesarily a relfecltion of their speed as they didn't complete soft tyre runs during the session.

Daniel Ricciardo had a brake issues around half way through the session causing his McLaren to be boxed for the remained of the session, he finsihed 11th while teammate Lando Norris was 8th.