Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix – Free Practice 2: Bottas leads, Verstappen and Leclerc have trouble

The tests resume at 2:30 p.m. this Friday afternoon following rather lively FP1s. The weather has cooled down again, making it even more difficult to understand the tires.

Following their slight collision, Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon are not penalized by the FIA nor missing any track testing session time, as the cars were able to be repaired in time.

Even though the single-seaters have changed little since 2020 and the teams have a lot of exploitable data to adjust their single-seaters, the testing sessions remain essential. On the one hand, the weather conditions are different and on the other hand, they have been shortened by half an hour for this year. Thus, the slightest mistake on the track, or the slightest technical issue can become dramatic and compromise the rest of the weekend.

Verstappen breaks down at the start of the session.

After just ten minutes, Max Verstappen had to park his car at the side of the track, shortly after the finish line. While he was in a fast lap chasing the times of Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton, having notably reclaimed the best time in the second sector, his car decided to give up the fight that was brewing between Red Bull and Mercedes. Thus leaving the field open to the reigning multi-champions to improve their performances. A quarter of an hour in, Valterri Bottas leads the discussion with a tenth of a second ahead of his English teammate and at least one second ahead of the rest of the field led by Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari. It is also worth mentioning Lando Norris’s harmless off-track excursion. The McLarens seem to struggle on this Italian circuit.

More meticulous stewards on track limits.

As we experienced a certain farce in Bahrain during the opening round of this 2021 season, the stewards decided to crack down at Imola. Charles Leclerc is the first to feel the consequences. Taking provisional pole position in this session, his time is immediately invalidated after the violation is noted. The drivers have been warned!

At halfway point, the Mercedes are struggling on red tires

Whether it’s on Valtteri Bottas’ side or on Lewis Hamilton’s side, the switch to soft tires is not favorable to them. Neither of them is able to improve their current lap times achieved on the yellow rubber. On the contrary, the other contenders are making better use of this tire category, allowing Ferrari to close in on Red Bull and Mercedes. Pierre Gasly even manages to achieve a small feat by ranking third in this provisional classification, 78 milliseconds behind the Finnish leader.

Second part of the session dedicated to long runs

The schedule is busy on Friday, and over a shortened period of a third this year. The drivers chain long relays without waiting. The FP2 takes place in the afternoon, at the same time as the race, making it the ideal moment to acquire as much data as possible. The work is mainly done on mediums for Mercedes and most teams and on softs for Ferrari. It is likely that only one tire change will be made during the race (if it doesn’t rain).

Session interrupted 2 minutes before its end

Charles Leclerc is the second driver to retire in FP2. Off-track excursion for the Monegasque driver. Both Ferrari and Alfa seem quite lively on their rear end. Charles Leclerc paid the price two minutes before the end of the session. The incident, which occurred at low speed at the end of the track, is minor but indicates a behavior that needs to be corrected for Sunday’s race. The positive point for the reds remains the pure performance, and in this game, the predictions place them in second position behind the two Mercedes.

Free practice 2 ranking