Rocky first session in Canada. Great testing and a lot of spins from the best drivers of the world were seen. Max Verstappen takes first place for the first time this season in a free practice.
You don’t have to wait long for the first mistakes of Free Practice 1 to happen. With only three minutes on the clock, Franco Colapinto spins while attempting to make his tyres in temperature. Isack Hadjar is the first one to make a viable time, in medium, in 1:15.419. Everyone was on soft tyres during the whole session, except for the Visa Cash App Racing Bulls F1 Team’s drivers, beginning on mediums.
New elements on the car
Some teams bring new specifications this weekend. The first one is not really new for the team but, Yuki Tsunoda finally has the same car as his teammate. He was on the old one since his Imola’s crash where they were unable to provide the elements for the triple header.
On the other side, McLaren has brought a new front wing. And that’s where they deciided to direct that Free Practice 1 session. Oscar Piastri goes out first with the old one while Lando Norris goes with the new one. When both of them had the new front wing on, the Papaya team focused on the aerodynamics test. This explains why they were so far back on the timesheet.
Time for mistakes
Almost everyone seemed to struggle for this session. Kimi Antonelli locked the rear and almost went into the wall. Lando Norris made a mistake at Turn 10, costing him a lot of time, when he was purple on both first sectors. Directly after the green flag waving, a yellow flag is called. George Russell almost spins and Lando Norris is finding the grass. Lewis Hamilton also spins at Turn 10. Max Verstappen almost collided with Lewis Hamilton with the Ferrari driver being a bit in the middle of the track. A little while later, Max Verstappen slightly touches the “wall of champions” with his rear tyre. With seven minutes remaining, Lando Norris almost went straight into the wall at Turn 10.
The two most important moments of the session were the red flag was called with 45 minutes to go because Charles Leclerc clipped the wall at Turn 4, locking his front tyres. At the same time another incident almost happened with Alex Albon changing trajectory while Gabriel Bortoleto was coming during a fast lap. Something that happened once more with the William’s driver trying to move out of the racing line but doing dangerous moves, this time on Fernando Alonso.
With longer runs being made towards the end of the free practice session, this means no one improves. Max Verstappen takes the top of the sheet in 1:1.193. Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz complete the top three.