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Lewis Hamilton has started his weekend off in Austria in fine form, setting a lap time of 1:05.975. The Brit's lap was set on the soft compound, the hardest of the three brought by Pirelli this weekend in Spielberg.
Valtteri Bottas was third with a time of 1:06.345 on the super soft compound. The Finn had a couple of off-track excursions, spinning at turn 1 as he tried to tune himself into the challenging circuit.
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Red Bull appear to have some solid pace at its home track as Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo ended the session second and fifth respectively. Verstappen's lap was three-tenths of a second slower than the Silver Arrow of Lewis Hamilton.
Ferrari was fourth and sixth and will be hoping to change its fortunes this weekend, with the last victory coming for the Prancing Horses in Monaco. Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel was just over two-tenths of a second faster than teammate Kimi Raikkonen.
McLaren-Honda also started its weekend very strongly as the struggling partnership got itself seventh and ninth with Stoffel Vandoorne ahead of his experienced teammate. Honda has brought a 'spec 3' engine to the Red Bull Ring which will supposedly improve speed and reliability. Splitting the two McLaren's was Daniil Kvyat, who was eighth while rounding out the top 10 was the Force India of Esteban Ocon.
Felipe Massa was eleventh, arriving in Austria in bitter disappointment after missing out on a potential win in Baku. Following the Brazilian was Kevin Magnussen and Carlos Sainz.
An under pressure Jolyon Palmer was fourteenth, ahead of Lance Stroll who will be full of confidence after picking up his first podium in Azerbaijan two weeks ago. The second Haas of Romain Grosjean followed the young Canadian.
Sergey Sirotkin and Alfonso Celis were P17 and P18 for Renault and Force India. Both men will hand the seat back to the forest drivers at the teams for the second practice session this afternoon, while the Sauber's of Pascal Wehrlein and Marcus Ericsson completed the list of times.
? "I slightly clipped the wall..." the Dutchman informs his team after he slid off ⬇️ at Turn 7 #AustrianGP ?? #F1 pic.twitter.com/7e4HTlT1bk
— Formula 1 (@F1) July 7, 2017
Fergal Walsh
Red Bull Ring - 07 July 2017
Azerbaijan Grand Prix
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Replies (2)
Login to replyf1fan0101
Posts: 1,804
And they're looking very strong, yet again....
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Doubt this round was representative, I expect Ferrari to get much stronger. But McLaren can be anywhere at this rate.