Great Britain – Free practice: Rosberg stopped, first for Charles Leclerc

A first official session is always a special day for a driver. This is what Charles Leclerc experienced this Friday at Silverstone. As a member of the Ferrari Driver Academy, the young driver was able to take Esteban Gutierrez’s seat, a former Scuderia protégé at Haas. The current GP3 leader was thus able to complete the planned program, making only a small mistake with a spin in the third corner.

The performance was clearly not the goal of the day as he had to get used to the procedures required for driving a modern Formula One car, as he himself acknowledges: « It was an incredible experience for my first time in a Formula One. I struggled quite a bit at the beginning because Silverstone is a challenging track, with many high-speed corners, and I found the steering wheel quite hard compared to what I’ve driven so far. However, it was a very good session, and I gained confidence lap after lap. »

Another French-speaking driver took to the track during this first Silverstone session. It was Esteban Ocon in Kevin Magnussen’s Renault. The Frenchman experienced his first real session of the season since his session in Barcelona had been cut short by a technical problem. This time, there were no issues on the horizon, even though his lap time reference didn’t allow him to do better than 19th: « Overall, it was a productive day both for me and the team. They were delighted with how this Friday went. We had a clean session while being able to carry out all the planned procedures and actions. I learned a lot today as it was my first run with the car on a very fast track. I was getting closer to the limits in the fast sections. It’s hard to get there, but I need to keep pushing and learning. I can’t wait to have more free practice sessions and gain more experience. »

On the top side of the standings, Lewis Hamilton edged out his teammate in the morning session by just three hundredths of a second. Behind them, Nico Hülkenberg confirmed his good form shown during the Austrian qualifications with the third fastest time of the session, just ahead of the two Ferraris and the two Red Bulls.

But the afternoon session was set to deliver an unpleasant surprise for the championship leader: while a water leak had initially been detected on his car, he ended up being stuck in his garage for the entire session, leaving Lewis Hamilton free to dominate the timesheet once again. The Briton did not miss the opportunity and clocked a time three-tenths faster than the Red Bulls of Daniel Ricciardo and Max Verstappen.

McLaren confirmed its relative return to form as Fernando Alonso managed to secure the sixth-fastest time of the session, just behind the two Ferraris. However, Jenson Button was there to remind us that the reliability issues with his Honda engine were still ongoing, as the Briton was stuck in his garage for part of the session before eventually setting the ninth-fastest time, between Romain Grosjean and Felipe Massa.

PROVISIONAL CLASSIFICATION (END OF #FP2): HAM ⬅ 0.391 secs ➡ RIC ⬅ +0.626 secs ➡ VES #BritishGP 🇬🇧 #F1 pic.twitter.com/yJDhG8ZQsI

— Formula 1 (@F1) July 8, 2016