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LAS VEGAS — The second Formula One practice session for the 2025 Las Vegas Grand Prix was disrupted by a suspected loose manhole cover, which caused Thursday night’s running to be suspended twice and ended early.
FIA race control officials stopped the session via red flags, with 21 minutes of the one-hour running remaining after a marshal reported a possible loose manhole cover at Turn 17. This is the fast left-hand corner that leads onto the pit straight at the end of a lap at the Las Vegas Strip Circuit.
An FIA spokesperson said that the red flag stoppage was a “precautionary measure,” while personnel were sent from race control to inspect the manhole cover. As these staff were initially “confident everything is in a suitable condition to resume the session,” according to a second FIA statement, the session resumed with six minutes left on the clock.
But it was then red flagged again just four minutes later, around the same time Leclerc had to stop his car at Turn 5. The officials, who had remained in attendance at Turn 17, had by this point also decided the manhole cover was possibly not as secure after all, as the F1 cars passed over it again. This meant further inspections were required and the session ended two minutes early.
The cause of the suspected manhole cover problem is down to the design of the current era of F1 cars, which use large floor parts on the underside of the chassis to generate downforce, via an aerodynamic principle known as ground effect. As this effectively sucks a car into the ground as they shoot along at high speed, huge forces are placed on some of the fixtures and manholes around the street circuit, effectively sucking these upwards. They require extra welding ahead of the race weekend to keep them in place.
After the manhole cover at Turn 17 had been inspected, qualifying for the all-women F1 Academy support series started only two minutes later than planned shortly after the F1 practice session had concluded. The session ran without any stoppages, concluding just after 10 p.m. F1 Academy cars don’t produce the same aerodynamic forces as F1 cars and so do not place manhole covers under such extreme stress.
The loose manhole cover near Turn 17 at the Las Vegas Strip Circuit during FP2 at the 2025 Las Vegas GP (Kym Illman/Getty Images)
This is not the first time that F1 practice for the Las Vegas GP has been interrupted by these circumstances.
For the inaugural running of this race in 2023, opening practice was cancelled after just eight minutes of the expected 60 when then Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz ran over a water valve cover, which came loose and destroyed the underside of his car.
That led to inspections of every single cover around the street circuit, which incorporates the famous Strip in Las Vegas. This delayed the start to the second practice session that ultimately concluded at 4 a.m. PT, after which time fans had been told to leave the track.
They were not offered refunds for tickets, but were instead offered a merchandise voucher by the race organizers to make up for the loss of action.
But unlike 2023, on Thursday fans got to watch the vast majority of on-track action as scheduled. Opening practice ran uninterrupted from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. and there were no stoppages for the first 39 minutes of FP2.
The issue is also not exclusive to the Las Vegas track. In 2019, an incident with a loose manhole cover led to practice for the Azerbaijan GP — which also takes place on a similar high-speed street circuit in the Azerbaijan capital, Baku — being cancelled after just over 10 minutes of running.
The underside of George Russell’s Williams car was severely damaged when he ran over the manhole cover.
F1 world championship leader Lando Norris ended second practice in Las Vegas with the fastest time for McLaren, finishing 0.029 seconds clear of Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli.
The loss of running did prevent a number of drivers from setting a quick, qualifying simulation lap time on the softest compound of tire, including Norris’s primary championship rival, Oscar Piastri. He ended FP2 in 14th place.
Final practice in Las Vegas is scheduled to begin at 4:30 p.m. on Friday ahead of qualifying at 8 p.m.
