Practice 1 Report - Verstappen fastest in opening practice in Italy

By Peter Habicht

Max Verstappen set a fastest time of 1:22.657s around the historic Monza Circuit in opening practice this afternoon for Red Bull, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz just 0.046 behind the Dutchman, whose teammate Sergio Perez trailed by 0.177s. Charles Leclerc was 0.309s fourth quickest behind his teammate Sainz, while Mercedes’ George Russell was fifth quickest running 0.532s from the front. All five set times on the hard compound tires ahead of Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso who ran mediums and McLaren’s Lando Norris who was on softs.

Mercedes Lewis Hamilton was eighth fastest on hard tires ahead of the rest who were mostly on soft compounds, followed by Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, Williams’ Alex Albon, McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, Albon teammate Logan Sargeant, and New Zealander Liam Lawson, who has been driving in place of teammate Daniel Ricciardo who continues to recover following hand surgery after his Alpha Tauri impacted the wall in practice a week ago at Zandvoort.

Alpine’s Pierre Gasly was 14th quickest, followed by Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas and Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg. Gasly teammate Esteban Ocon led from Felipe Drugovich, driving as part of the rookie practice program in the place of Lance Stroll today for this session. Haas’ Kevin Magnussen and Alfa’s Guanyu Zhou were 19th and 20th, respectively.

Free practice two begins at 5pm.