Hamilton leads the pack in second practice at Barcelona
Lewis Hamilton delivered an outstanding performance in Free Practice 2 (FP2) at the Spanish Grand Prix, topping the timing charts ahead of Carlos Sainz and Lando Norris.
Earlier in the day, Lando Norris had set the fastest time during the first practice session. However, with Ferrari, Mercedes, and Alpine opting not to use the soft tyre in FP1, there were still uncertainties about the true pecking order heading into FP2.
The second practice session kicked off with most of the field running on medium or hard compound tires. Logan Sargeant provided an early moment of drama when he narrowly saved his Williams from a spin. Max Verstappen reported understeer issues with his RB20, noting, “This car doesn’t bite.”
Initially, George Russell posted the fastest time at 1m 14.089s using medium tyres. But as the session progressed, attention turned to fast laps on the soft compound tyres. Carlos Sainz briefly held the top spot in front of his home crowd before Lewis Hamilton snatched it away by just two hundredths of a second. Hamilton's best lap of 1m 13.264s remained unbeaten as drivers shifted focus to race simulation runs.
Top Ten in FP2:
Lewis Hamilton - Mercedes - 1m 13.264s
Carlos Sainz - Ferrari - +0.020s
Lando Norris - McLaren - +0.109s
Pierre Gasly - Alpine - +0.174s
Max Verstappen - Red Bull - +0.218s
Charles Leclerc - Ferrari - +0.351s
Oscar Piastri - McLaren - +0.412s
George Russell - Mercedes - +0.514s
Esteban Ocon - Alpine - +0.606s
Valtteri Bottas - Kick Sauber - +0.689s
Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg placed 11th and 12th for Haas, with Hulkenberg getting his first track time of the weekend after Oliver Bearman drove his car in FP1. Sergio Perez finished in 13th, running out of sync with the rest of the field after delayed soft tyre laps.
Fernando Alonso ended the session in 14th for Aston Martin, 11 years after his last F1 win at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. The Red Bull duo of Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo followed in 15th and 16th, respectively. Zhou Guanyu, navigating an older chassis to regain confidence, claimed 17th for Kick Sauber, while Lance Stroll placed 18th in the second Aston Martin.
The Williams teammates, Alex Albon and Logan Sargeant, completed the standings in 19th and 20th places.
With Friday's practice sessions done, teams will analyze the data collected to refine their setups ahead of the third and final practice session and the all-important qualifying on Saturday.
