Madring Practice and Qualifying

Practice drama, costly crashes and a tense qualifying battle—the Spanish Grand Prix weekend has delivered plenty so far at the Madring 

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Hey everyone, welcome to Boxbox Box, your friendly neighborhood podcast. This is Mohan here, coming to you with an update of practice and qualifying at the Spanish Grand Prix at the brand new Madering in Madrid. And after two days of F1 cars attacking this place for the very first time, I think the Ferris description is spectacular, extremely quick, and just a little bit intimidating. Mercedes stopped every practice session, George Russell in FP1 and Antonelli in FP2 and FP3. And for most of the weekend it looked as though the fight for Paul would run through the silver cars. Ferrari were consistently close, Verstappen kept improving, and McLaren appeared to be playing catch up, particularly after Lando Norris lost almost all of FP2 with a gearbox problem. Then qualifying reached its final seconds and Norris produced one of those laps that completely rewrites the weekend. He took pole from Antonelli by 11 thousandths of a second. Before we get to that, there is plenty to unpack. This was the first F1 weekend at the 5.4km 22 corner Madring with its mixture of public roads and purpose-pill sections, blind high-speed approaches and the huge bent turn 12 known as La Monumental. We had mechanical trouble traffic, repeated trips down the escape roads, four significant contacts with the barriers across Friday and Saturday, a frantic repair job that did not quite succeed, both Spanish drivers knocked out in Q1, and a penalty that changed the back of the grid. So let's get through it session by session. FP1. This was really a one-hour recon mission. Nobody had genuine track data. The surface was fresh, grip and breaking points were changing almost lap by lap, and traffic was a problem from the moment all 22 cars poured onto the circuit with several narrow sections and blind corners. Perez returned for Cadillac with the steering saw steer him have a steering wheel problem, while both Alpines stayed in the garage for roughly the first 15 minutes. Antony ran wide at turn 30. Bortoletto and Holcomb both cut the turn 5 chicken. And Leclerc later carried too much speed into turn 17 and took the escape road. None of those moments caused damage, but they showed how little margin there was between finding time and ruining a lap. At the front, Ferrari initially looked strong. Hamilton led Leclerc at the halfway point, although Hamilton's time had come down on the medium tire, while several others had moved to the soft. Russell's first soft tire attempt was sparred by traffic, but when he finally found space, he delivered a 1 minute 34.077. That put him 0.286 seconds ahead of Antonelli, with Leclerc third, Hamilton fourth, and Verstappen fifth. So Mercedes had set the first benchmark. Then we moved on to FP2. This session brought the first proper crash of the weekend and a major setback for the man who would eventually take Paul. Norris completed only two laps before McLaren found a gearbox problem. The team changed the gearbox, but the work kept him in the garage for the rest of the session, so he recorded no representative time and lost the only Friday practice held at roughly the same time of the day as qualifying would be the following day. Alonso also started late because Aston Martin had to deal with the clutch issue that appeared after his F-1 practice. Piastri was at least able to keep gathering information for McLaren, although he complained about a lack of rear grip. Ferrari continued to look competitive, but its drivers were losing time in the final sector compared with Antonelli. The headline incident came from Linblad, who had been one of the surprises of the session. He was fourth fastest and particularly quick through the opening sector when he pushed too hard approaching turn 13, lost the rear of the racing bus car and hit the barriers. That impact brought out the red flag. Linblad was unhurt though, but the damage was serious enough for the team to change the chassis before FP3. When the running resumed, there was not enough improvement to dislodge Antonelli. His 1 minute 33.662 remained the fastest lap. By Friday evening, the picture looked fairly convincing. Mercedes and Ferrari were the teams to beat over one lap. Verstepan was within striking range, and but McLaren had a lot to do. But Norris had one advantage hidden inside the setback. His mechanics had managed to fix the car, and he still had FP3 left to try and learn as quickly as possible. So then we go on to FP3, where the circuit really showed its teeth. Antonelli ended up fastest again, but the session contained three separate barrier contacts and two red flags. One of those crashes removed the driver from qualifying altogether. Alburn was the first casualty. He tapped the wall early in the session, and at the first and at first the damage looked minor, but the contact broke the rear track rod. Williams as a result parked the car, leaving him without a time lap and with very little preparation for qualifying. Then came Hamilton's crash at the final corner. He locked up, went into the Tech Pro barrier and damaged the front wing and both front tyres. Hamilton initially tried to continue despite the team orders, but Ferrari warned him about the damage and then identified a right front puncture. He eventually stopped at the side of the circuit, bringing out the first red flag with about 15 and a half minutes left. At that point, Hamilton only completed five laps. Yet his earlier time was still good enough for 9th at the end of the session. Once the track reopened, the fight at the front became very tight. LeClerc produced the first lap of the weekend in the 1 minute 32s. Piastri moved close and then Antonelli responded with a 1 minute 32.797. That left him 0.166 ahead of Leclerc and 0.189 ahead of Piastri. There was just enough time for one final burst of drama. Bierman lost control of his Haas through turns 10 and 11 and hit the wall hard on the exit in the final minute. The red flag ended the session early with Biermann managing to climb out safely, but the car was badly damaged, and Haas had less than two and a half hours before qualifying to try and fix the car. Then we go on to qualifying. In qualifying, it began with only 20 cars being able to take part. Bierman's Haas was still being repaired after that FP3 crash, while Lance Stroll remained in the Aston Martin Garage with a suspected water pressure problem. Stroll was already facing a back-of-the-grid start after exceeding his Honda power unit allocation, but he could not set a time anyway. Russell set the quicker slapped off Q1, a 1 minute 33.017, just 56,000th ahead of his teammate Antonelli. It was not a completely tidy run. Russell at one point brushed the wall and Mercedes checked the car as a result of that, but he escaped without any damage. That had ended Albon's FP3 session. Verstappen used the medium tire rather than the soft and still progressed comfortably, while Lawson went third fastest on the soft. The real tension happened at the cutoff. Albon coming into session with no FP3 time grabbed the final Q2 place by only 5 thousandths of a second over teammate Science. That meant both home drivers went out immediately. Sainz qualified 17th and Alonso 18th. Perez and Bottas were 19th and 20th respectively among the recorded relapse, with Stroll and Bierman listed behind them without any times. Then we moved on to Q2. Versteppen moved to the top of top in Q2. Although he later pointed out that he had used two sets of tires. So the comparison with some rivals was not an equal one for him. Antonelli was second, and the leading teams all looked close enough to keep Paul genuinely open. Kolopintock supplied the biggest heart in the math moment on his first attempt. His rear stepped out through La Monumental, the law, and he had to abandon the lap. He gathered the Alpin up without hitting anything, returned for the final runs, and then produced the eighth fastest time to manage to get into Q3. It was a very good recovery from him under pressure. Linblad also managed to make it to Q3 despite his FP2 crash and the limited running that he had on the new chassis. Piastri progressed with exactly the same Q2 lap as Linblad, while the two already fell short. Hulkenberg was 11th and Bottoleto 12th. Ocon qualified 13th, Gasly 14th, which was a huge turnaround from his form in Monza, and Sunoda 15th. Later Albon was classified 16th after his divisive buildup and could not repeat the late escape that he managed in Q1. Then we moved on to Q3. Hamilton set the early pace in this session with a 1 minute 32.079, which was a very strong recovery after his FP3 crash and the rapid repair job that his engineers had to do. Antonelli and Russell followed in. LeClerc sat fourth and Verstappen was fifth after losing time at the final corner. At that stage, Norris was only sixth. The final runs then unfolded almost perfectly for suspense. Antonelli delivered a 1 minute 31.835 and moved into provisional poll. He later said he had lost a little time at the first chicken and had been cautious at turn 13 after a big moment on his first Q3 lap. But it was still an excellent lap. Versteppen moved to third, 0.140 away, after deliberately running late to find clean air. Norris was the last of the main contenders to finish. He had to find roughly 7 tenths compared with his first Q3 lap, and he managed to do it. Even after drifting wide and brushing the wall at the final corner, he crossed the line in 1 minute 31.824, just 11,000ths faster than Antonelli. Norris later called it one of the best laps of his career, and given that he had completed almost no FP2 running, it was very hard to argue that sentiment. That as a result gave Norris the 19th pole of his Formula One career and his third of the season, as well as taking the honor of the first poll at the new Mandarin Circuit. Antonelli starts alongside him with Verstappen 3rd, Hamilton and Leclerc qualified fourth and fifth respectively. Russell 6th, Piastri 7th, Lawson 8th, Colopinto 9th, and Lindblad 10th. Qualifying itself managed to avoid a red flag or a major crash, which felt almost surprising given the events of FB3. But it still delivered plenty of drama, particularly with Russell's brush off the wall, Colopinto's save, and the science bottles impeding incident that happened during those sessions. So that is where we stand ahead of the first Spanish Grand Prix at the new Madering circuit. Norris and Antonelli share the front row, separated by 11,000th of a second in qualifying, with Verstappen directly behind them and both Ferraris in the top five. Russell starts 6th and needs to turn the race back in his favor because Antonelli arrived at this circuit with a 66-point championship over his teammate. Track position here matters enormously because several drivers have said overtaking will be extremely difficult. The pit lane is unusually long and Friday's long run suggested meaningful tire degradation. This creates quite an awkward strategic equation for the teams. The run to the first chicken will be crucial, but so will survive the 57 laps around a fast circuit with blind approaches and very little forgiveness for mistakes. We have already seen what happened to Linblad, Alburn, Hamilton, and BM in the practice, and plenty of others use the escape roads during those sessions. If the race itself produces the same level of drama as practice, there will be no short of things, shortage of things to talk about afterwards. Thank you for listening, and I look forward to speaking to you on the other side of this race. Have a good night, thank you.