One by one, ball in the center. After closing the first free practice session of the Singapore Grand Prix behind the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc, McLaren turned the situation around in the second and final free practice session on Friday.
On the track illuminated by the amazing system that allows for night racing, Lando Norris set the best time of the session in the qualifying simulation in 1’30″727, a time faster than the one that earned him pole position on Saturday last year.
The time, obtained by Norris with Soft compounds, was approached only by Leclerc, slower by only 58 thousandths of a second compared to the McLaren driver. All the others starting from Carlos Sainz, a good third, suffered gaps of more than 6 tenths.
In short, Norris and Leclerc seem to have already found the right confidence with the track. But if Norris during the free practice sessions tried the Soft tyres as a possible compound for the first stint of the race, Leclerc and Sainz preferred to focus on the Medium and Hard, thus trying to have numerical references to be able to arrive at the race ready, predicting the duration and response of the two harder compounds.
For this reason it is difficult to compare the race pace of the two cars that, to date, seem to be the most competitive, those accredited to compete for pole and victory. So everything is postponed until tomorrow morning, when however the last free practice session will be held in the sun and with slightly higher temperatures than the afternoon qualifying.
The surprise of the day was undoubtedly Racing Bulls Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo who finished the session in fourth and sixth place respectively, interspersed with Oscar Piastri’s McLaren. The VCARB01s sport a celebratory livery for one of their sponsors: it therefore seems that they have purposely used a more powerful engine mapping to stand out on an important occasion. But only tomorrow will we be able to have confirmation of this supposition.
After a convincing mid-summer, McLaren now seems to be back to being the fourth force of the season and with a significant gap from the top three teams. George Russell, seventh, suffered a delay of over 7 tenths from Norris, while Lewis Hamilton did not go beyond 11th, almost 1 second from the reference time.
If Mercedes’ difficulties are news, they are – and in an even greater tone – those that seem to be gripping Red Bull. Sergio Perez is eighth at 871 thousandths from Norris, while Max Verstappen is even 15th at 1″3. The RB20s are struggling to adapt to the bumps in the track, but they also seem much more nervous, searching for a set-up that already in Baku seemed far from perfect.
If this situation were to continue tomorrow, Verstappen could really start to worry about the Drivers’ World Championship title, even though there are fewer and fewer races left until the end of the season.
Alexander Albon confirms a Williams in strong growth with the ninth place, only 52 thousandths behind the first Red Bull, that of Perez. After a good morning, Franco Colapinto is 16th. The top 10 is completed by the Haas VF-24 of Nico Hulkenberg. The German, 17 thousandths slower than Albon, left behind the aforementioned Hamilton with the second Mercedes, but also the two Aston Martin AMR24 of Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll, in addition to the twin single-seater of Kevin Magnussen.
The two Alpines sadly close the standings with Esteban Ocon 17th and Pierre Gasly 18th, but the tail light remains Sauber, with GuanYu Zhou 19th with almost half a second advantage over a Valtteri Bottas who is increasingly distant relative of the one seen between Williams and Mercedes.
#Singapore #Free #Practice #Norris #narrowly #ahead #Leclerc #Max
