Free Practice 1 Recap: Hamilton Leads From Bottas

Lewis Hamilton set the pace in the first session of the season, lapping half a second faster than team-mate Valtteri Bottas in second.

The reigning world champion set a 1:24:026 to make a huge statement in practice.

Hamilton was not near the top of the timesheets during the second tests, and there were fears that Mercedes were struggling with graining on the softer compound tyres, but Hamilton showed that these issues were nothing to worry about as he lapped consistently on the ultrasoft tyres.

Ferrari, perhaps continuing the mind games, chose not to run on the ultrasoft tyre, leaving Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel fourth and fifth respectively, almost a full second behind Hamilton.

Max Verstappen was the quickest of the Red Bull boys, achieving third place as he and Ricciardo sandwiched the Ferrari’s, Ricciardo in his home race completing FP1 in sixth position.

One of 2018’s most intriguing battles is certain to be the battle to be ‘the best of the rest’ and finish P4 in the constructors’ standings.

From testing, it seemed as if there are five teams in the mix, with Reanult, Haas, Toro Rosso and McLaren all challenging Force India, who have finished fourth in the previous two seasons.

Haas’ Romain Grosjean was the quickest outside the top six, but less than two-tenths quicker than Fernando Alonso’s McLaren and Carlos Sainz’s Renault.

Vandoorne was next in what was overall a positive session for McLaren, however they did suffer an exhaust issue on Alonso’s car early in the session.

This brings up questions on whether McLaren will have the reliability to truly show their pace this season, after suffering issues in testing as well.

They clearly have the pace to regularly challenge for points, and most F1 fans will be hoping the car allows two-time world champion Alonso to truly show his skills , battling at or at least near the front once again.