2023 F1 Season: Free Practice 1 Results and Newcomer Test Highlights

2023-11-24 10:32:00

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The holders will return for important EL2s

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The last Free Practice 1 session of the year took place in Abu Dhabi, on the Yas Marina circuit which serves as the setting for the last F1 round of this 2023 season. This was contested during the day, while EL2, at 2 p.m. French time, will be held at night.

Tests reserved for young drivers oblige, ten beginner drivers were behind the wheel this Friday morning, that is to say half of the peloton! The only team not running one was AlphaTauri, as they have already run their two debutants this year with Nyck de Vries and Liam Lawson.

Conversely, Red Bull had not yet given free testing to rookies until then, and it was therefore Isack Hadjar, driver of the sector and F2, and Jake Dennis, development driver who was champion of the Formula E world this year, who drove in both RB19s. Red Bull took the opportunity to test one of its performance engineers as a race engineer.

At Mercedes, Frederik Vesti was at the wheel, while Robert Shwartzman found the Ferrari. McLaren brought in Pato O’Ward, its IndyCar driver and new reserve for 2024, while Aston Martin gave a drive to Felipe Drugovich.

At Alpine F1, it was Jack Doohan who replaced Esteban Ocon, while Zak O’Sullivan had the wheel of Alex Albon at Williams. At Alfa Romeo, Théo Pourchaire had another chance after his FP1 marked by major mechanical problems in Mexico. At Haas, finally, it was Ollie Bearman who was at the wheel of Nico Hülkenberg’s VF-23.

Note that the only team to bring new features is AlphaTauri, which is testing the latest elements to incorporate into its 2024 concept, which should change drastically next year.

Several drivers set times at the start of the season, and it was George Russell who set the first benchmark in the first 10 minutes of the session. The Briton was not satisfied with his car but improved to 1’26″963.

All the drivers, with the exception of Carlos Sainz and Shwartzman, were on medium tires at the start of the session. Russell continued to improve in 1’26″313, ahead of Yuki Tsunoda who was second at the start of the session.

A lot of groundwork took place during this session, and an accident was narrowly avoided when Logan Sargeant blocked the path of Doohan, who was coming at full speed and said on the radio that he had “avoided the worst accident of my career”. The incident and the American’s erratic driving will be studied after the session.

Russell improved to 1’26″081, and Sargeant took second place ahead of Oscar Piastri then Vesti. Russell, Sargeant and Vesti were on soft compounds, while Piastri and Lance Stroll, ranked fifth, had medium tires.

Pierre Gasly set the second fastest time, six tenths behind Russell nonetheless. The hierarchy was obviously very difficult to guess in these EL1, with ten starters absent and times more than two seconds from the 2022 pole.

Despite two best absolute first sectors, which is not surprising given his straight line performance, Sargeant failed to place his Williams in the lead. Stroll made a very big slide coming out of the last corner, but caught it.

In addition to Vesti, Pourchaire, O’Ward and Dennis moved back into the top 10 among the beginners. Bottas moved up to second and Ricciardo to third. With ten minutes to go, Drugovich moved up to second, and Shwartzman placed his Ferrari in sixth.

Sainz also set the sixth fastest time, despite a slide in the last corner which we also saw on the side of O’Sullivan and O’Ward. Shwartzman suffered a scare in turn 3 due to a slide.

Piastri complained of being embarrassed by Sainz, and referred to the recurrence of incidents of this type with the Ferrari driver: “From the classic Carlos to staying in the middle of the track, nothing changes from what I see .”

Russell finally finished first in this astonishing session, ahead of Drugovich and Ricciardo. Bottas and Stroll complete the top 5 ahead of Piastri, Sainz, Shwartzman, Gasly and Tsunoda. Sargeant is 11th ahead of Vesti, Doohan, Pourchaire, O’Ward, Dennis, Hadjar, O’Sullivan, then Magnussen and Bearman.

Pos.PiloteVoitureTempsTours

01
George Russell
Mercedes W14
1:26.072
26

02
Felipe Drugovich
Aston Martin Mercedes AMR23
1:26.360
26

03
Daniel Ricciardo
AlphaTauri Honda RBPT AT04
1:26.433
26

04
Valtteri Bottas
Alfa Romeo Ferrari C43
1:26.453
21

05
Lance Stroll
Aston Martin Mercedes AMR23
1:26.631
21

06
Oscar Piastri
McLaren Mercedes MCL60
1:26.665
25

07
Carlos Sainz
Ferrari SF-23
1:26.676
24

08
Robert Shwartzman
Ferrari SF-23
1:26.703
25

09
Pierre Gasly
Alpine Renault A523
1:26.720
26

10
Yuki Tsunoda
AlphaTauri Honda RBPT AT04
1:26.725
27

11
Logan Sargeant
Williams Mercedes FW45
1:26.742
27