As expected, the first day of track action at the Las Vegas Strip circuit was characterised by a lack of grip, which led to tyre graining on long runs, with the track evolving throughout, as it was very dirty to start with, so this evolution will continue at the Nevada circuit during the weekend. In the second and quicker of the two sessions, Carlos Sainz was fourth fastest ahead of team-mate Charles Leclerc and it’s clear there is still plenty of work to do, for the qualifying session and in race trim.
FP1. With air temperature at 14 degrees and the track at 16 and dropping, Charles and Carlos started off on Medium tyres, getting to grips with running between the walls and with the heavy braking requirements of this track, as the times gradually came down. The pair then switched to the Soft compound for qualifying simulation work, their lap times dropping to 1’36”007 for Leclerc and 1’36”218 for Sainz. Towards the end of the hour, both Ferraris ran with a heavier fuel load to run in race trim on the Medium tyres from the start of the session. Between them they completed 53 laps, 27 for Charles and 26 for Carlos.
FP2. In the session that began at 22 (7 CET) once again Leclerc and Sainz started off on Medium tyres, setting times of 1’34”476 and 1’34”775, before going faster on the Soft compound: Carlos got down to 1’34”104, while Charles was caught up in traffic, posting a 1’34”313. After a brief red flag when Alex Albon stopped on track, the Ferraris went back out with a heavy fuel load. Sainz and Leclerc each completed 29 laps.
FP3. The third free practice session that starts at 18.30 local (3.30 CET on Saturday) will be important both in preparing for qualifying and the race. The grid positions will be decided at 22 local (7 CET) and the team will have to ensure it does the best possible job of preparing the tyres for the flying lap. The Grand Prix starts at the same time on Saturday and the Scuderia and all other teams must fine tune car set-up to limit the effect of graining, caused by the cars sliding on the track surface that provides only limited grip, which could have a significant effect on performance.
Carlos Sainz #55
A complicated Thursday here in Vegas due to a challenging track with very low grip which gave us a strange feeling inside the car. 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.
Charles Leclerc #16
It was not a great day for us and it seems to have been tricky for everyone else as well. We are not as strong as we expected to be coming into the weekend. With the cold weather conditions, it was difficult to bring the tyres up to temperature, which we knew would be a challenge, so we will work on that. Let’s see what we can do tomorrow.