Bottas over Hamilton in opening practice for the Emirates GP

Bottas gets service in the Mercedes pits

Using their superior car that cannot be beaten, Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton led an easy Mercedes 1-2 in opening practice for the Emirates GP at Silverstone.

Bottas' time of 1m26.166s was 0.138s faster than a sandbagging Hamilton and a whopping 0.727s faster than the Red Bull of Max Verstappen.

Nico Hulkenberg was 4th quick in the #27 'pink' Mercedes while Charles Leclerc rounded out the top-5 for Ferrari 0.896s behind Bottas.

Most teams used the first 90-minute practice session to evaluate and better understand Pirelli’s softer compound tires following the 3 late failures that occurred in the final three laps of the British Grand Prix.

F1 tire supplier concluded the punctures were caused by “extremely long use" on a demanding circuit and is sticking with its original decision to supply even softer tires for this weekend’s 70th Anniversary GP.

Practice 1 Results