Mercedes turned its head in Miami in Free Practice 1

Mercedes led the first free practice of the Miami GP with a double: Russell set the fastest time at 1’30″125 and Hamilton second at 0″212. But be careful: these are only the first practices and the last hours must be understood within a clear context: the improvement of the track seen on the new asphalt in Miami, a very hot asphalt, but at the same time very dirty, full of dust , which did not generate the expected grip and could be a puzzle for all the teams before the qualification and the race. Times say the stars are dominating, but in reality, what can be gleaned from this FP1 is Verstappen and Leclerc started very strongly, Sainz was more comfortable than in Baku and is in contention again this weekend, and Fernando Alonso should aim to fight to get closer to that Top-4 in ‘qualifying’, as he did in Baku.

On a very ‘green’ asphalt, facing Saturday or Sunday, if it rains, the small rubber that is placed on it may disappear again, it is very important that the teams understand the behavior of the tires with the new asphalt in the two sessions this Friday and how to put them in the right window of use temperature, because these conditions can be reproduced at the weekend. That had to be everyone’s priority in a first free practice session where Verstappen started to dominate from the start, improving every lap, showing himself to be very strong, as if he wanted to mark the territory from the start against a ‘Checo’ Pérez who unhinged him a week ago in Baku with amazing rhythm. The Mexican was the only one not to set a good time in this FP1, languishing in 11th place, while Max started strongly.

Sainz was 3rd and Alonso 4th before the final laps

The Dutchman was the fastest until he decided to ‘pass’ the clock and focus on your hard work at the end of the session. He put 0″253 on a Leclerc that started on the right foot. Charles kept the rubber soft and eventually managed to beat the Dutchman by tenth. In that context, Sainz was third behind Max, two tenths behind his teammate Charles, and Alonso was fourth, 6 tenths behind Verstappen.

when is that Mercedes, committed to working with medium rubber, put on a soft tire with 4 minutes to go to take advantage of the best moment of a track that he improved a lot to set the best time.

In the end, Russell took the lead with a 0″212 advantage over Hamilton, with Leclerc 3rd at 0″324, Verstappen 4th at 0″424 and Sainz 5th at 0″ 599. Gasly put in a good final turn to be 6th and Alonso 7th in 1″106, without attacking the clock in the final turns as some of his rivals did. There are still many things that must be cleaned and nothing specified after the first session in It is difficult to make an exact conclusion, that everyone looks at the rubber bands and has many cards saved.

So far, the sensations are better for Sainz compared to Baku. In Azerbaijan he suffered greatly due to ‘set up’ issues in a weekend where there was only one free practice session to change the settings. Now, after saving a good fifth place in Baku, Carlos is closer, in the tour, to think ahead of a ‘worthy’ where Ferrari wants to beat Verstappen again.

For his part, Alonso started by warning of little grip on the track. He did not finish his first lap on the soft rubber due to a red flag caused by an accident by Hülkenberg and then set his time on the same tire. It will be necessary to see what the green car saves in terms of performance in a turn. They should be up against Ferrari and Mercedes. For Alonso to be closer to his fourth podium in 5 races, it is important that his car improves on a lap that could have been done in Baku if the DRS had not failed. Here, DRS should never go wrong.

Sainz, the new floor does not exist

Ferrari had important additional work in this first session which will be replicated in Free Practice 2: they need to test the new floor, using a different diffuser which allows to reduce the aerodynamic load and the air resistance of the Ferrari to be faster in a straight line and at the same time to improve its tire wear and racing speed. Leclerc tried it in his car, not Sainz. The reason is none other than get a direct comparison in both track conditions of this new solution and the previous one to understand if the new land is really a step forward. The equation will be repeated for FP2, and if it really works, Leclerc and Sainz will ride it out on Saturday.