The drivers had to wait until 2.30 am to get onto the track and start the second free practice session of the Las Vegas GP. It had never happened before that F1 had to run in the middle of the night to make up for the time lost in the session which was canceled after just 10 minutes due to the manhole cover which opened up on the long straight of the Strip and was hit by Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari, destroying power unit, battery and control unit, as well as the chassis. The Cavallino mechanics were extraordinary as they rebuilt the Spaniard’s car from scratch. The same goes for Esteban Ocon’s Alpine which had had a similar problem, although less serious.
At the end of the hour and a half we find ourselves with two Ferraris in front of everyone and with Charles Leclerc capable of trimming a half second off his teammate with a 1’35″265 obtained with a set of softs. The Spaniard is second at 517 thousandths and with the looming penalty of 10 positions on the grid for the replacement of the battery which is the third of the season and, therefore, sends the Madrilenian to a penalty. The college of sports stewards did not take the responsibility of removing the sanction from Ferrari, perhaps for not to create a precedent, but it is always the Cavallino team that loses out, in a race that could be in favor of the red. The SF-23 handles the very long straights and slow corners well: the Circus found favorable conditions to wear the tires in temperature (15 degrees of asphalt), given that greater frost was feared.
The Scuderia once again demonstrated good adaptability to new tracks. Leclerc had a Monza-type aerodynamic configuration, but with an additional nolder on the mobile flap, while others chose a more loaded set-up, fearing the asphalt with less grip and more slippery. It is probable that tomorrow the others will also go in the same direction as the Cavallino.
Fernando Alonso with Aston Martin is third just 11 thousandths behind Sainz, a sign that the greenback seems to have overcome the crisis after the excellent Brazilian GP. The Silverstone team can also rely on Lance Stroll’s seventh place although separated from the Asturian by seven tenths. The news of the day is that the Red Bulls did not stand out: Sergio Perez is fourth, eight tenths behind Leclerc, while Max Verstappen is actually sixth, almost in second. The fact that Valtteri Bottas slipped in between the two RB19s with Alfa Romeo says a lot about the fact that the world champion team had a soft approach to the Nevada street circuit.
Nico Hulkenberg’s performance was also positive, seventh with Haas, with Kevin Magnussen only 13th with the other VF-23. The top 10 closes with Lewis Hamilton ninth with Mercedes ahead of Alexander Albon’s Williams. During the race simulation, the Anglo Thai tried to use a set of hard tires with little success, a sign that the weekend will be dominated by soft and medium tyres.
The Mercedes did not impress, with George Russell rather fouled with long shots and spins with the W14 in difficulty especially when braking. Lando Norris is 11th with McLaren: the Englishman had lost some time due to a cooling problem which was resolved brilliantly and then moved to mid-grid, with Oscar Piastri 14th.
On a track where the engine counts, you can’t expect an Alpine to be in evidence: Pierre Gasly and ESteban are 15th and 16th respectively, ahead of Yuki Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri, while Daniel Ricciardo is only 19th with the other AT04, beautiful to see but for now not very good performance.
This time Guanyu Zhou took them cleanly from his Finnish teammate and was second to last just behind the home team, Logan Sargeant, who made a run at the barriers: he got away without any major damage and it went well…
#Las #Vegas #Free #Practice #Ferraris #ahead #Alonso #Max #sixth