Barcelona F2: Leclerc leads Albon by 0.042s in practice

Prema Racing driver Leclerc, who leads the F2 championship after winning the sprint race in Bahrain last month, set a best time of 1m29.974s one third of the way through the 45-minute session at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

The 19-year-old was the only driver to produce a sub-90-second laptime and he finished 0.042s clear of ART Grand Prix’s Alexander Albon.

Sergio Sette Camara finished third for MP Motorsport, ahead of his teammate Jordan King, with Racing Engineering’s Louis Deletraz in fifth place.

Shortly after setting his best time, Sette Camara was frustrated with Gustav Malja – who set the 17th quickest lap – when the Swedish driver appeared to impede him under braking at Turn 10.

Artem Markelov, the winner of the feature race in Bahrain, set the sixth-fastest time, just in front of Rapax driver and McLaren F1 junior Nyck de Vries.

Arden’s Norman Nato, who won the feature race in Barcelona in 2016 when the series was known as GP2, ended up eighth fastest.

Luca Ghitto was ninth in the second Russian Time machine, which lost a piece of bodywork when the Italian arrived on the main straight midway through the session.

Although Ghiotto was able to carry on and complete the session, the virtual safety car was briefly deployed as marshals retrieved the errant piece of bodywork.

Sergio Canamasas rounded out the top 10 for Trident, with Renault F1 junior driver Oliver Rowland 11th for DAMS, and the Honda-backed Nobuharu Matsushita 12th for ART.

Leclerc’s Prema team-mate Antonio Fuoco finished down in 19th place after not setting a representative time until the second half of the session as his mechanics had worked on his car in the pitlane early on.

He finally set a best time that was 2.8s slower than Leclerc’s best and was one of a number of drivers to slide wide at the exit of Turn 13.

Things got worse for Fuoco – who is also a Ferrari Academy driver – when he pulled over at the side of the track on the run up to Turn 12 and climbed out with just over a minute remaining.

Alex Kalinauckas / Autosport

Practice results

Pos.	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap
1	1	Charles Leclerc	Prema Powerteam	16	1'29.974
2	8	Alexander Albon	ART Grand Prix	21	1'30.016	0.042
3	14	Sergio Sette Camara	MP Motorsport	17	1'30.484	0.510
4	15	Jordan King	MP Motorsport	19	1'30.599	0.625
5	3	Louis Deletraz	Racing Engineering	17	1'30.644	0.670
6	6	Artem Markelov	RUSSIAN TIME	16	1'30.843	0.869
7	18	Nyck de Vries	Rapax	21	1'30.882	0.908
8	20	Norman Nato	Arden International	19	1'30.886	0.912
9	5	Luca Ghiotto	RUSSIAN TIME	15	1'31.043	1.069
10	17	Sergio Canamasas	Trident	19	1'31.086	1.112
11	9	Oliver Rowland	DAMS	16	1'31.094	1.120
12	7	Nobuharu Matsushita	ART Grand Prix	21	1'31.157	1.183
13	11	Ralph Boschung	Campos Racing	16	1'31.355	1.381
14	21	Sean Gelael	Arden International	17	1'31.355	1.381
15	19	Johnny Cecotto	Rapax	9	1'31.394	1.420
16	12	Roberto Merhi	Campos Racing	20	1'31.444	1.470
17	4	Gustav Malja	Racing Engineering	18	1'31.560	1.586
18	10	Nicholas Latifi	DAMS	18	1'31.600	1.626
19	2	Antonio Fuoco	Prema Powerteam	17	1'32.845	2.871
20	16	Nabil Jeffri	Trident	12	1'32.989	3.015