Italian Grand Prix – Max Verstappen topped the opening practice of the weekend at Monza, finishing just ahead of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz.
Lando Norris led the way out of the pits as the first session at the Temple of Speed got underway. For the second race in a row there is a rookie driver taking part in FP1, this time it’s Felipe Drugovich taking control of Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin for the hour.
Practice Results – 2023 Italian Grand Prix
After coming in as a last minute replacement for Daniel Ricciardo last weekend, Liam Lawson remains in the AlphaTauri this weekend and for however long it takes for Ricciardo’s broken hand to fully recover.
The first time of the day was a 1:24.429, set on the hard compound tyre by Lewis Hamilton, who this week confirmed he, and George Russell, had signed a two year contract extension with Mercedes. After the opening ten minutes it was McLaren’s Oscar Piastri who was at the top of the times with a 1:23.446 on softs, with the Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez less than a tenth slower on the hards.
At that stage only twelve drivers had set times while neither of the Williams or Alfa Romeo cars had emerged on track. The Alfas had tried to go out on track but anti-stall issues on both cars meant they had to be brought back to their garage before they were able to leave the pits.
After a further ten minutes had past it was Red Bull and Ferrari at the top, Verstappen holding the best time, a 1:22.657, three tenths ahead of Charles Leclerc while Perez and birthday boy Carlos Sainz were a further tenth or so back each in P3 and P4. A couple of minutes later Logan Sargeant became the first Williams on track and was then followed by Alex Albon – who missed FP3 onwards last year after getting appendicitis, which gave Nyck de Vries his F1 debut – while Zhou Guanyu and then Valtteri Bottas also made it out soon after.
While Verstappen was dealing with helmet lift, things weren’t all fixed on Bottas’ car as he reported that he had no rear grip in the medium and high speed and it felt like something had stalled. Things didn’t improve for the Alfas, both drivers complaining of the car bottoming out against the track and they pitted with Bottas describing his car as “undriveable”. Things seemed to have been fixed on the second go though with the drivers much happier when they re-emerged.
As the clock ticked down to fifteen minutes left in the session, Verstappen’s time was still enough to hold P1 but Sainz and Perez had improved with the Spaniard less than half a tenth off while Perez was almost two tenths slower than his teammate.
There weren’t any improvements at the top by the time the chequered flag flew, with Verstappen, Sainz, Perez and Leclerc remaining in the top four spots with just three tenths between them. Russell slotted into P5 with a 1:23.189, over half a second off Verstappen while Fernando Alonso and Norris slotted in behind him. Hamilton and Yuki Tsunoda were only separated by 0.002 seconds in P8 and P9 while the top ten was rounded out by Albon with a 1:23.444.
Lawson ended the session in P13, half a second off his teammate’s best, while Drugovich was P18 with a 1:24.140.
