The Formula 1 race weekend in Imola is in full swing. How did the first practice sessions go?

Pirelli Gran Premio Del Made In Italy E Dell’Emilia Romagna – that’s the full name of this Grand Prix. We’ve had our first two practice sessions. What can we expect from tomorrow’s qualifying and Sunday’s race?

We’ve had our initial practice sessions for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix. A lot of positives from Friday’s practice sessions for the Maranello stable.

Charles Leclerc praised the performance of his Ferrari. The race pace also looks very promising, the Ferrari is looking really strong on this track.

The only blemish on the day, according to Leclerc, was a driving error when he failed to handle the last corner and ended up in the wall.

Mercedes are also finding plenty of positives from practice. Lewis Hamilton in particular was not happy with the state of his car in Bahrain: “The team did a lot of work to understand what happened in the last race where we were weak. We also wanted to improve the set-up. But it’s also true that the local track suits us better.”

The fastest man, however, was his teammate Valtteri Bottas. He dominated both practice sessions and, based on his words, is happy with his progress so far.

Bad luck is nipping at the heels of Red Bull and Max Verstappen. The latter was betrayed by his technique in practice and was forced to retire his car.

Red Bull’s co-driver Sergio Pérez again collided with Esteban Ocon in the Alpine midway through Friday’s practice. However, both explained the situation to the sporting commissaires and the whole matter was avoided without penalty.

The Ferrari and Mercedes cars clearly dominated the practice sessions. The top ten order was otherwise quite varied, but so far the McLarens are not doing well at all. Lando Norris was thirteenth and eighth, Daniel Ricciardo tenth and eighteenth.

The Emilia Romagna circuit is also much cooler than Bahrain. Rain is even forecast for Sunday. The balance of power is very interesting at the moment and if the weather is bad, we will have a really interesting qualifying and race on Sunday.

Qualifying for Sunday’s race starts at 14:30 after the last practice session.

Source: F1 Sport, Livesport