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Team Summary:
The opening Friday practice for the 2022 Azerbaijan Grand Prix would get
underway with a rush of drivers coming out including the first of the
Williams. The second Williams car would be second last to come out with the
majority of drivers on the medium tyre. Both Aston Martins were on the soft
and both Ferrari's the hard. Bottas would set the first time with a
1m:53.677 followed by Sainz and Gasly. But the times would quickly change
with Verstappen quickest with a 1m:48.574 followed by Perez and Leclerc. The
Williams pair would currently be 12th and 15th as Schumacher was to suffer a
water leak seeing him having to pull off the track ending his session.
Gasly was now third followed by Ricciardo, Leclerc, Sainz, Alonso, Bottas,
Norris and Hamilton tenth. The VSC would be applied but shortly after the
session would restart and Verstappen would set a 1m:46.932 ahead of Perez
and now Alonso. Leclerc would move in to second with Sainz now fifth ahead
of Gasly. The Williams pair were currently 15th and 16th but with an engine
issue one car was out of the session which had produced another VSC. Gasly
was now fourth and Tsunoda now fifth ahead of Sainz. With thirty two minutes
remaining we would see the remaining Williams return for a run on the soft
tyre.
Drivers would start to come out for soft tyre runs including the Williams.
On the soft tyre Verstappen would set a 1m:46.477 remaining quickest. He
would improve with a 1m:45.810 to extend his lead at the front. Perez was
second followed by Leclerc but Sainz would move into this spot but Perez on
the soft tyre would set 1m:45.476 to be quickest ahead of his team-mate.
Sainz was now third followed by Leclerc, Alonso, Tsunoda, Norris, and
Russell eighth. With fifteen minutes remaining Hamilton would move up to be
fifth as we then saw Leclerc go second. ten minutes remaining and we would
have the Williams return going back to the medium tyre. The session would
end with the order Perez, Leclerc, Verstappen, Sainz, Alonso Hamilton,
Tsunoda, Russell, Gasly and Ocon tenth. The Williams drivers would finish in
17th and 19th in a session which again really shows the limitations of the
FW44 as it currently stands.
Alex Albon:
After a bit of a delay Alex would follow out Nicholas also using the medium
tyre. Alex would set a 1m:52.740 to be eighth dropping to 12th. He would
improve with a 1m:50.101 but would drop to 14th. This would become 16th as
he pitted after a seven lap run. Alex with just over thirty minutes
remaining would return on the soft tyre. With a 1m:48.419 would see Alex
ninth. Alex would pit after a five lap run but would return currently 11th
still on the soft. He would drop to 13th commenting to his engineer "I have
a good feeling that the hot car is going to be powerful again. Just doing
the push-cool, the tyre feels so different..." Alex would pit after a two
lap run currently 14th. Ten minutes remaining and Alex would return using
used medium tyres as he dropped to 17th. He would finish the session with a
seven lap run on the medium.
Nicholas Latifi:
Nicholas would be first out for Williams running on the medium tyre. He
would set a 1m:56.563 to be seventh but dropped to tenth. This would quickly
become 19th but with a 1m:53.395 he would be 15th. Nicholas would set a
1m:50.921 to now be 16th. Nicholas would say that he car just died and had
come back on again but had again switched off. His car would be removed from
the side of the track but for Nicholas it was his session over. He had
dropped to 19th as the session progressed. |
