LAS VEGAS — Cold temperatures led to slippery conditions for racers and teams during the first two practice sessions for the second annual Las Vegas Grand Prix Thursday night.
Some teams conquered the conditions. Others did not.
Lando Norris was second quickest in practice for McLaren.
“Thursday done in Vegas. It’s nice to be back in the car. It was tough out on track. It’s slippery and there’s very low grip, similar to last year so we expected these conditions,” Norris reported. “A challenging combination. It’s slightly difficult to feel comfortable and get the car in a good place, but we made some progress, which is always positive. We still have some more work to do, so we’ll debrief and prepare for tomorrow.”
Carlos Sainz was the top Ferrari driver in fourth.
“A complicated Thursday here in Vegas due to a challenging track with very low grip which gave us a strange feeling inside the car,” Sainz said. “For FP2 we tried something different but we are still not satisfied with where we are and we need to keep working on it. Hopefully the analysis tonight will help in finding our biggest areas of improvement and we can get to qualifying in better shape. Race pace wasn’t too bad, but there’s still a lot to do.”
Championship point leader Max Verstappen struggled to find speed, finishing the night 17th on the time sheets.
“It was really slippery on track today,” Verstappen said. “I think we struggled to make the tires work, especially over one lap, and we were quite far off with the pace. On the long runs we started off a bit more competitively, but we still need to fine tune a few things. It is very cold and the conditions are quite unique around here.
“However, at the end of the day this is the same for everyone, so we need to understand what we are doing wrong. The issue for us is definitely tire related as we have no grip and it feels like driving on ice. We will look into what we can do to fix this and hopefully improve for tomorrow.”
Sauber’s Zhou Guanyu was 16th on the board and echoed Verstappen’s remarks, saying, “It was like ice skating.”