F1: Sainz Jr. tops opening practice for the USGP

The F1 circus has landed back on American soil for the second race on these shores after Miami, and based on the smiles on show, everyone is pretty happy to be here.

A firm favorite with most of the field, wide enough to overtake, will elevation changes and a whole raft of different style corners. A weekend to savor.

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz Jr. turned a lap of 1m36.857s to top opening practice for the USGP at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA).

World Driving Champion Max Verstappen was 2nd quick, 0.224s behind, but said he was not yet happy with the setup of his car.

Lewis Hamilton, with the upgraded Mercedes, was third, 0.475s behind.

Lance Stroll was a surprise 4th for Aston Marin, 0.658s back while Sergio Perez, who will take a 5 place Grid Penalty for a new Internal Combustion engine Sunday rounded out the top-5 in the 2nd Red Bull.

Five young drivers turned laps in the session.

Alex Palou drove for McLaren in place of Daniel Ricciardo, but he never had a run on the soft Pirelli tires and finished in 17th, 3.054s behind.

Antonio Giovinazzi drove the Haas in place of Kevin Magnussen. His session ended after only 4 laps when he ran out of talent, clouted the barrier and broke the transmission – his session over.

Robert Shwartzman had the reins of Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari and was 16th quick despite being balked on his final quick lap. Shwartzman did find himself blocked by Verstappen in the final corner on his final flying lap meanwhile, and he tentatively complained on the radio in a very polite way. It was a shame as it was set to be his best lap to date, and instead he remained 16th.

Theo Porrchaire was in the Alfa Romeo in place of Valtteri Bottas and was 18th.

Logan Sargeant was in the Williams in place of Nicholas Latifi and finished 19th.

So the ‘Friday’ drivers wind up occupying the bottom five places, with four of them giving a decent account of themselves. It was only Giovinazzi who couldn’t, thanks to an early spin that left him caught up against the barriers in an incident that damaged his clutch and ended his session.

Hamilton was running with aero rakes early on, with Mercedes bringing their last big raft of upgrades to this race. It’s apparently now or never for their ‘zero pod’ design concept, hence the last big block of upgrades.

Practice 2(6:00pm ET) will be an extra 30 minutes long, so Pirelli can test 2023 tires and the teams can judge their characteristics.

Practice 1 Results