F1 Verstappen’s fastest before Ferrari’s Sainz and Leclercini practice at the Austrian GP

Max Verstappen set the pace in the only practice for this weekend’s Austrian GP as the championship leader clocked 1:05.742 on the medium tyres. He beat the soft-shoe Ferrari pair of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc by more than two tenths. the second at the start of the second Sprint weekend of the 2023 season.

At the beginning of the session, Verstappen was on the track early and in his first flying lap on Hard tires, the Dutchman drove at an early pace with a lap of 1:08.094. The champion was followed by teammate Sergio Prez, also on hard tyres, and the Mexican’s first driver placed him in P1, 0.499 seconds ahead of Max with a lap of 1:07.595. The Red Bull pair then swapped top spot with Verstappen finishing almost a second above his opening flyer to regain P1, before Prez improved to 1:07.111 to edge out his team-mate by 0.034s. However, Verstappen had the pace in hand and just before the 10-minute mark he set a lap of 1:06.961 to move 0.150 seconds ahead of his team-mate, with Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes a further 0.243 seconds behind in third.

Aston Martins Fernando Alonso then took P1 on the Medium tyres, but it was 15 minutes before Verstappen took P1 again, this time with a lap of 1:06.598.

The Red Bull drivers headed back to the garage and that left the way clear for Hamilton to jump into P1 with a lap of 1:06.416 with Verstappen in P2 ahead of Alonso and Prezi. Fifth was Alex Albon as the Williams driver produced an early eye-catcher on the soft tires to stop the clock at 1:06.794.

Midway through the session, after some long runs and some improvements, most of the field switched to soft tires in the final 10 minutes. The exceptions among the pioneers were the Red Bull drivers, who drove on medium-sized Pirelli tires.

Verstappen jumped back to the top of the timesheets with a lap of 1:06.084, 0.125 seconds clear of soft Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc. Prez’s first pilot on the yellow tire put him in P3 with a lap of 1:06.262. Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz then went fastest on Softs with a time of 1:05.983.

After a flying first lap on the Medium, Verstappen did three slow laps before a final flight that put him on top for the last time. His lap time of 1:05.742 was good enough to put him over two tenths ahead of Sainz and Leclerc. Hamilton was fourth on the softs with Prezi in P5 with a 1:06.262 on the last Medium tire.

Lance Stroll finished sixth for Aston Martin with a lap of 1:06.340 and Haas Kevin Magnussen seventh ahead of Alonso, while Mercedes’ George Russell was ninth and Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu rounded out the top ten.

2023 FIA Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix Free Practice
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing 1:05.742 30 236.451
2 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1:05.983 0.241 32 235.587
3 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:06.012 0.270 33 235.484
4 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:06.251 0.509 34 234.634
5 Sergio Prez Red Bull Racing 1:06.262 0.520 32 234.595
6 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:06.340 0.598 29 234.320
7 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:06.497 0.755 27 233.766
8 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:06.656 0.914 31 233.209
9 George Russell Mercedes 1:06.696 0.954 28 233.069
10 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo 1:06.780 1.038 33 232.776
11 Alexander Albon Williams 1:06.794 1.052 23 232.727
12 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:06.809 1.067 36 232.675
13 Nico Hlkenberg Haas 1:06.846 1.104 30 232.546
14 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo 1:06.847 1.105 33 232.542
15 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 1:06.985 1.243 34 232.063
16 Nyck de Vries AlphaTauri 1:07.017 1.275 36 231.953
17 Logan Sargeant Williams 1:07.018 1.276 25 231.949
18 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:07.202 1.460 30 231.314
19 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1:07.287 1.545 28 231.022
20 Lando Norris McLaren 1:07.368 1.626 20 230.744