AUSTIN, Texas – The Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team led the way on the opening day of practice for the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix Friday at Circuit of the Americas Friday.
Valtteri Bottas had the fastest lap of the day during the opening session as he navigated the 3.426-mile road course in 1:34.874. His teammate, seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton, was right on his heels with a best lap of 1:34.919. Despite leading the way in practice, Bottas faces a five-place grid penalty after his team installed a new engine prior to race weekend.
“I think we have a good car here and even with my five-place grid penalty, we can still have a good race from wherever I end up starting,” Bottas said. “Today showed it is pretty close at the front but it’s still all to play for. Because of the penalty, the main thing for me was focusing on the long-run pace and that’s what we did, especially in FP2. There’s still a lot of work to do with the set-up, as it wasn’t easy to drive and, in some places, the track has lost quite a lot of grip, so the balance was inconsistent. But we’ll look at the best options tonight and see what we can do, because I will be racing other cars and need to overtake if I want to make it to the podium and fight for the win.”
Hamilton, who trails championship leader Max Verstappen by six points entering the weekend, completed a lap that would have put him fastest during FP2. However, that lap was deleted due to a track limits violation. Despite that, Hamilton still finished the day second fastest overall.
“Generally, it’s been a good day but there’s still work to do,” said Hamilton. “The first session was really good, but I made some changes for FP2 and I wasn’t as happy with the car. The pace wasn’t bad, but I think we lost a bit of ground to everyone, so we need to dig into the data tonight and figure out why. The surface here feels rougher and that means it’s a struggle to keep the temperature out of the tires, so there’s more degradation than we’ve experienced before. It’s been a productive day so we have plenty of findings that we should be able to navigate well and improve for tomorrow.”
Red Bull’s Sergio Perez was third fastest on the combined speed charts based on his fast lap in FP2, which was the fastest lap turned in the session after Hamilton’s fast lap was deleted. He was followed by McLaren’s Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll.
Verstappen struggled for pace throughout the day, managing to go third fastest in FP1 and eighth fastest in FP2. Overall, his best lap (1:35.806) left him nearly a second off the fastest lap set by Bottas.
“Overall it wasn’t easy out there today, the track is quite bumpy and to find the right compromise on the car hasn’t been the easiest but there are a few positive things to look at and we’ll continue to work on that overnight,” Verstappen said. “In FP2, we didn’t manage to put the lap in on the soft tire and it was also just a bit of a mess with the traffic. Hopefully everything will come together tomorrow so we can get a good lap in qualifying.”