By Mark Gero
Taking advantage of a poor Friday practice session for Sunday’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix by the top two drivers for the world formula one championship, the two Ferrari’s of Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc took a 1-2 in the. afternoon’s session with the seven-time world champion leading the charge with a 1:41:293 best time.
The Mercedes duo of George Russell and Kimi Antonelli were next in third and fourth, respectively.
Another team that had a good day on the Friday practice was the American Haas team, who placed Oliver Bearman in fifth, and Esteban Ocon eighth. Red Bull’s Max Verstappen had a quiet day, taking sixth with the sister Racing Bulls driver Liam Lawson seventh. The Williams of Alex Albon ended the day in ninth.
But the big news in the afternoon was the bad performances of both leading series drivers Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris. Despite taking the opening session in the morning, Norris himself was involved in an incident with 30 minutes left in the afternoon session when the Briton touched the concrete barrier at turn four, damaging his suspension. Normally the rules state that a damaged car should stop, but Norris limped his Mclaren back to the pits and finished the day in tenth.
As for Piastri, it was not any better, but the Australian hit the techpro barriers at turn 15 but managed to be a little better off than his Briton teammate and went back to the pits where the team fixed the issue and sent Piastri back to practice. Piastri did not improve his performance and finished the day in 12th.
If the second session had some incidents worth noting, the morning was even crazier. Piastri encountered a power unit issue, while Verstappen’s pit box sprang a leak, with a puddle right in the garage. Many struck the barriers like Hamilton, who shaved off his edge plate at turn five. Russell complained of a burning in the car, and Albon was hit by Piastri, tearing off one of his mirrors.
But the session was only 16 minutes in when a red flag was put out for debris, which was extended when the issue was a kerb that was damaged more than had been expected.
Saturday qualifying will be very close for anyone that can keep himself from having any issues on a course that is very hard to negotiate.
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