F1 RUSSIAN GP FRIDAY PRACTICE 1 : BOTTAS FASTEST AGAIN IN SOCHI!

Valtteri Bottas set the pace in first practice ahead of Formula 1’s Russian Grand Prix, while his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton was 19th-fastest out of the 20 runners.

F1 Russian GP Practice – Hamilton spent the majority of the session running on the hard tyres, while Bottas was the pacesetter throughout the session as Mercedes split the programmes between its cars for FP1 at Sochi.

Bottas was half a second clear of the rest of the field, with Daniel Ricciardo second-quickest for Renault with a time set just inside the final 20 minutes.

That moved the Renault driver ahead of his former team-mate at Red Bull, Max Verstappen, who was 0.654s adrift of Bottas.

Racing Point duo Sergio Perez and Lance Stroll completed the top five. Stroll has a new chassis for this weekend following his high-speed crash in the last race at Mugello, and he is also running the team’s only set of updates again.

F1 RUSSIAN GP PRACTICE

F1 RUSSIAN GP FRIDAY PRACTICE 1 BOTTAS FASTEST

Racing Point did not have time to make two more sets for Russia after the parts Stroll used in the Tuscan GP were damaged in his accident as well.

Esteban Ocon was next up in the order, meaning Renault had both cars in the top six at the start of the weekend.

The low-grip Sochi surface led to several incidents during the session, with cars taking to the run-off areas after lock-ups and spins.

The drivers worst-affected were Carlos Sainz Jr and Nicholas Latifi, who both spun into the barriers.

Sainz crashed just after half an hour, spinning at Turn 7 and backing into the wall. He was able to drive the car back to the pits with its rear wing hanging off, but did not return to action before the chequered flag came out.

Williams driver Latifi crashed at Turn 10 around 20 minutes later, and his accident brought out the red flags as his car was stuck in the outside barriers.

Latifi ended the session as the only car behind Hamilton at the bottom of the order, while Sainz’s best time left him 12th, just ahead of team-mate Lando Norris.

Norris has a different race engineer for this weekend as his regular engineer is on paternity leave, and the British driver also got a chance to try out McLaren’s new nose design that Sainz ran in practice last time out in Italy.

VERSTAPPEN : WHY WOULD HAMILTON GO TO RED BULL?

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