Formula 1 British GP

F1 British GP: Norris heads opening practice from Stroll

Norris beat Stroll to the fastest FP1 lap at the British Grand Prix

Jake Boxall-Legge

Jake Boxall-Legge

Edited: Jul 5, 2024, 8:43 PM

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Lando Norris drew first blood at the British Grand Prix weekend at Silverstone to headline the opening Formula 1 practice session of the weekend, which featured an early red flag.

In cool conditions, albeit with the disappearance of the morning's mizzling rain, the track surface proved somewhat difficult in the early phases as grip was at a premium.

The early laps were over 90 seconds long, before Max Verstappen posted a 1m29.906s on the hard tyre to start bringing the pace into the right ballpark.

Lewis Hamilton, a seven-time British Grand Prix winner, made a significant leap with a 1m29.035s, before team-mate George Russell found a 1m28.888s time to move on top of the order.

Yuki Tsunoda produced a red flag as the opening 10 minutes drew to a close after losing grip at Luffield, spinning to send his RB into the gravel.

This prompted a hiatus of around eight minutes as the stranded VCARB 01 was collected from the gravel, before running could resume.

Russell again picked up the pace to set a 1m28.156s on the hard tyres and improved to a 1m28.046s shortly after, but Lewis Hamilton found a scant 0.003s advantage to move to the top of the order.

The two Mercedes were shaded by Carlos Sainz, who produced a 1m27.925s on the brink of the first half-hour's close. This coincided with a switch to the medium tyres among a handful of front-runners.

Russell and Charles Leclerc pressed these into service to move to the top of the order, but Verstappen shaded Russell by just 0.01s on the medium compound. The Dutchman found an extra smidgen over Russell to briefly extend his advantage by an extra three hundredths, before Russell responded in kind to restore the original gap.

Oscar Piastri then hurled his McLaren to the top of the order on soft tyres, but was then overlapped by team-mate Norris by two-tenths on the same compound.

Piastri's misery was compounded after crawling to a stop on his way to the pitlane, apparently suffering from a hydraulic issue. This forced the brief closure of the pitlane entry, as Piastri's car was collected.

Lance Stroll had put his Aston Martin between the two McLarens in the order, 0.134s behind Norris, and 0.211s clear of Piastri.

Verstappen had the fastest medium-tyre time, besting Russell, the soft-shod Fernando Alonso, and Leclerc. Sainz's hard-tyre time was good enough for ninth, ahead of Esteban Ocon.

Of the four rookie drivers given an FP1 opportunity, recently signed Haas driver Ollie Bearman was quickest among them: the Briton celebrated his promotion to the 2025 line-up with a 1m28.536s, 14th in the order.

Alpine reserve Jack Doohan beat Williams' Franco Colapinto to 17th, as Isack Hadjar was 19th fastest at the wheel of the Red Bull RB20 - nearly causing an incident with Norris at the end.

Main Information Additional Data Driver Info Driver Info

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Main Information Additional Data

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2

Cla Driver # Chassis Engine Laps Time Interval km/h 1 United Kingdom L. Norris McLaren 4 McLaren-Mercedes McLaren Mercedes 26

1'27.420

242.594 2 Canada L. Stroll Aston Martin Racing 18 Aston Martin AMR24 Aston Martin Mercedes 22

+0.134

1'27.554

0.134 242.223 3 Australia O. Piastri McLaren 81 McLaren-Mercedes McLaren Mercedes 18

+0.211

1'27.631

0.077 242.010 4 Netherlands M. Verstappen Red Bull Racing 1 Red Bull Racing-Honda RBPT RB20 Red Bull Red Bull 25

+0.309

1'27.729

0.098 241.739 5 United Kingdom G. Russell Mercedes 63 Mercedes W15 Mercedes Mercedes 26

+0.318

1'27.738

0.009 241.715 6 Spain F. Alonso Aston Martin Racing 14 Aston Martin AMR24 Aston Martin Mercedes 27

+0.374

1'27.794

0.056 241.560 7 United Kingdom L. Hamilton Mercedes 44 Mercedes W15 Mercedes Mercedes 26

+0.438

1'27.858

0.064 241.384 8 Monaco C. Leclerc Ferrari 16 Ferrari Ferrari Ferrari 26

+0.483

1'27.903

0.045 241.261 9 Spain C. Sainz Ferrari 55 Ferrari Ferrari Ferrari 27

+0.505

1'27.925

0.022 241.201 10 France E. Ocon Alpine 31 Alpine A524 Alpine Renault 24

+0.554

1'27.974

0.049 241.066 11 Germany N. Hulkenberg Haas F1 Team 27 Haas-Ferrari VF-24 Haas Ferrari 22

+0.662

1'28.082

0.108 240.771 12 Finland V. Bottas Sauber 77 Kick Sauber-Ferrari C44 Sauber Ferrari 26

+0.834

1'28.254

0.172 240.301 13 Australia D. Ricciardo RB 3 RB-Honda RBPT RB Red Bull 24

+1.057

1'28.477

0.223 239.696 14 United Kingdom O. Bearman Haas F1 Team 50 Haas-Ferrari VF-24 Haas Ferrari 25

+1.116

1'28.536

0.059 239.536 15 China Z. Guanyu Sauber 24 Kick Sauber-Ferrari C44 Sauber Ferrari 24

+1.170

1'28.590

0.054 239.390 16 Thailand A. Albon Williams 23 Williams FW46 Williams Mercedes 25

+1.229

1'28.649

0.059 239.231 17 Australia J. Doohan Alpine 61 Alpine A524 Alpine Renault 22

+1.315

1'28.735

0.086 238.999 18 Argentina F. Colapinto Williams 45 Williams FW46 Williams Mercedes 24

+1.658

1'29.078

0.343 238.078 19 France I. Hadjar Red Bull Racing 37 Red Bull Racing-Honda RBPT RB20 Red Bull Red Bull 15

+1.850

1'29.270

0.192 237.566 20 Japan Y. Tsunoda RB 22 RB-Honda RBPT RB Red Bull 5

+2.444

1'29.864

0.594 235.996 View full results

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