All 20 drivers wasted no time getting out because the condensed dash race format solely leaves groups a single hour follow to nail down their set-ups for the complete weekend.
Due to the dearth of follow time, duties had been cut up between race runs and only a handful of qualifying sims, with all groups kicking off proceedings on a dry Interlagos circuit on Pirelli’s laborious tyre compound.
Crimson Bull’s world champion Max Verstappen instantly set a lap of 1m13.950s on laborious tyres to go high forward of team-mate Sergio Perez, who’s trying to rebound from a heartbreaking Lap 1 crash in his Mexico residence race.
Each drivers quickly improved on the identical compound with Verstappen’s 1m13.138s placing him 4 tenths forward of the Mexican, following by Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton, Haas man Nico Hulkenberg and the second Mercedes of George Russell on the 15-minute mark, who later leapfrogged his team-mate into third.
After 23 minutes Yuki Tsunoda lit up the timing screens within the AlphaTauri, the Japanese driver stopping the clocks at 1m28.802s as the primary of the medium runners.
However simply earlier than the midway mark Tsunoda was bested by Verstappen after which Russell, who led with a 1m11.865s on the identical medium compound, earlier than Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso cut up Russell and Verstappen in second whereas nonetheless utilizing hards.
Photograph by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-23, Carlos Sainz, Ferrari SF-23
Kevin Magnussen, who was a late arrival after his Wednesday flight received cancelled, briefly appeared within the high three as the primary of the few soft-tyre runners. His team-mate Hulkenberg got here inside 0.063s of quickly snatching away first place from Russell, the Haas duo previous a flurry of soppy tyre runs from Ferrari and Williams within the ultimate third.
Russell was lastly dislodged by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz with a 1m11.732s on softs, with Leclerc making it a Ferrari 1-2.
Russell stayed third, forward of Hulkenberg, Williams man Alex Albon and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll.
Pierre Gasly was seventh for Alpine, following by Zhou Guanyu within the Alfa Romeo. Logan Sargeant and Magnussen rounded out the highest 10.
Alonso ended up in eleventh forward of Hamilton and Tsunoda, whereas Daniel Ricciardo shadowing his AlphaTauri team-mate in 14th.
Esteban Ocon adopted in fifteenth, with world champion Verstappen a low-key sixteenth – one second down on the Ferraris – after solely working on laborious tyres.
Photograph by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
Max Verstappen, Crimson Bull Racing RB19
Valtteri Bottas cut up the 2 Crimson Bulls as Perez adopted in 18th.
McLaren’s Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri propped up the timesheets after not setting occasions on the softest compounds, electing to save lots of them for later.
The session ran with out noteworthy incidents, though Norris and Hulkenberg escaped injury once they make glancing contact on the ultimate nook, which netted the German a visit to the stewards.
Hulkenberg later appeared to lose energy popping out of Flip 4, trundling again to the pits.
F1 Brazilian GP – FP1 outcomes