George Russell set the fastest time in Free Practice 1 for the Spanish Grand Prix, heading Mercedes team mate Kimi Antonelli as Formula 1 ran for the first time at the new Madring circuit in Madrid.
Russell’s best lap of 1m 34.077s left him just under three tenths clear of Antonelli, with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton completing the top four on the sport’s return to the Spanish capital. Max Verstappen’s Red Bull rounded out the top five.
The session began at 1330 local time, with cars sent out onto the 22-turn, 5.414km street circuit to gather information on a layout nobody in the field had raced before. Sergio Perez was the first driver to hit trouble, the Cadillac driver needing a new steering wheel, while both Alpines of Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto remained in the garage for the opening 15 minutes.
Lap times fell steadily as drivers used the medium Pirelli tyre early on, with traffic proving hard to avoid around the long lap. Haas driver Esteban Ocon reported that “the grip is high” as the surface continued to evolve. Drivers soon began pushing the limits: Antonelli ran wide at Turn 13, while Audi’s Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg both cut the Turn 5 chicane.
By the halfway point, Hamilton had moved to the top with a 1m 34.620s, fractionally ahead of Leclerc, with Antonelli a further two tenths back after switching to the soft tyre. Russell aborted his own first lap on the soft compound after running into traffic, while Liam Lawson used the same tyre to climb to fourth for Red Bull inside the final 30 minutes.
Russell was soon back up to speed, moving into third behind the two Ferrari drivers and ahead of Antonelli as tyre management became a growing issue, with Verstappen reporting graining on his medium tyres. Yuki Tsunoda’s session ended early when his Racing Bulls car was wheeled into the garage with 20 minutes remaining because of a power steering problem.
In the closing stages, most drivers focused on a single flying lap. Russell improved to a 1m 34.145s before lowering his time again to the eventual pace-setting 1m 34.077s. Leclerc could not find further improvement on the soft tyre and ran into the run-off area at Turn 17, while Antonelli climbed to second, ending the session less than three tenths off Russell’s pace.
Leclerc finished third, just under half a second off the pace, with Hamilton fourth on the medium tyre and Verstappen fifth. Lando Norris, Arvid Lindblad, Oscar Piastri, Hulkenberg and Lawson completed the top ten.
Bortoleto, Ocon, Colapinto, Gasly, home favourite Fernando Alonso and Ollie Bearman filled eleventh through sixteenth. Local driver Carlos Sainz was seventeenth, ahead of Tsunoda, Lance Stroll, Alex Albon and the two Cadillacs of Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas to round out the opening session at Formula 1’s newest venue.
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