In other news, Vettel is stymied by engine failure, and Racing Point is levied a stiff fine.
SILVERSTONE, England—August 7th—Very hot and dry weather might have been a hazard for most of the grid as teams prepared for Sunday’s 70th F1 Anniversary race that will be run at this Northhampshire circuit. Still, it did not matter in Friday practice for Mercedes’ drivers Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas.
Hamilton had the best time of the day with a 1:25:606, which bettered the 1:26:166 time set by Bottas earlier in the day. Daniel Ricciardo, who was just eight-tenths of a second off Hamilton’s time, earned third place in his Renault. The French team seems to do well on fast, low-downforce tracks, and there are a lot of those tracks on the docket in the coming weeks.
Most of the teams used Friday to plan for a long-fuel run, but Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel never got a chance to test. He stopped on the circuit in the second session with engine failure. His car was leaking hydraulic oil, which was very evident at Copse corner.
The session ended strangely, too. With 90 seconds to go, Antonio Giovinazzi’s Alfa Romeo stopped just off the circuit, bringing out the only red flag of the day. But with a small amount of time left, officials decided to run out what time there was left in the session.
Behind Ricciardo was Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who took fourth, while the Racing Point pair of Lance Stroll and Nico Hulkenberg were fifth and sixth, respectively. That was the good news. The bad news?
Racing Point was fined 400k Euros and stripped of 15 points in the Constructor’s Championship. Both penalties came as a result of a protest filed by Renault for using illegal brake ducts. Ferrari and McLaren are appealing the verdict.
On a side note, Hulkenberg is racing for the second week in a row, taking the place of Sergio Perez, who failed another COVID-19 test.
Charles Leclerc finished seventh in the second Ferrari, while both McLaren’s of Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz Jr. took eighth and ninth, respectively. Esteban Ocon finished tenth in the second Renault.
As fans look forward to Sunday’s race, eyes are also riveted on an off-track matter. Mercedes has not signed the 2021 agreement, which is raising eyebrows because the team has dominated F1 for the last six seasons.
