McLaren’s Lando Norris finished Friday at Spa-Francorchamps atop Formula 1’s pecking order after setting the fastest time in Free Practice Two for the Belgian Grand Prix.
An almost unheard-of 100% dry day of running was completed on Friday at Spa-Francorchamps, allowing all competitors to complete push laps on soft Pirelli rubber and race simulations.
The former of those two was of course what set the order and top billing went to Norris, courtesy of a 1:42.260s, 0.215s clear of McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was the best of the rest behind the two papaya machines, just two-thousandths of a second slower than Piastri’s best effort.
The Ferrari duo of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz don’t see themselves as likely contenders for the top positions at Spa but duly completed the top five in Friday afternoon’s practice session.
That resigned Mercedes’ George Russell to sixth, but he fared far better than team-mate Lewis Hamilton, who narrowly broke into the top-10 by 0.013s over 11th-placed Lance Stroll.
The filling in the Mercedes sandwich began with Alpine’s Esteban Ocon, who missed the entirety of FP1 because of a water leak on his car’s hybrid system.
Kevin Magnussen guided his Haas to a top-10 standing in eighth with Red Bull’s Sergio Perez in ninth.
Behind Hamilton and Stroll came the latter’s Aston Martin team-mate Fernando Alonso, with Sauber’s Valtteri Bottas 13th at the conclusion of the hour-long FP2 session.
Daniel Ricciardo led the RB charge in 14th place but was forced to retreat to the pits with four minutes left in the session amid technical trouble before returning to the track in the final moments for a sighting lap.
Alpine’s Pierre Gasly held the 15h fastest time ahead of 16th-placed Nico Hulkenberg of Haas.
Alex Albon wasn’t able to replicate his third place from FP1 and instead had the 17th best effort and Logan Sargeant finished right behind the Anglo-Thai driver in the order, perhaps confirming the rest of the weekend could prove tricky for the Williams squad.
19th went to Sauber’s Zhou Guanyu with him and last-placed Yuki Tsundoa roughly two seconds off of the ultimate pace set by Norris.
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