Max Verstappen is steadily pushing his Red Bull into contention at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Although his second-quickest time to Lando Norris’s McLaren was around 0.35s adrift, his long run was over 60% longer than that of the McLaren driver’s and the 0.43s difference in their race run averages on the medium tyre is almost accounted for by the difference in run length.
Furthermore, that includes a step-change drop-off in pace for the last three laps of Verstappen’s run where he was convinced that something was broken in the car. If we take his average up until the moment he reported that problem (with three laps of his run still to go), he is within less than 0.1s of Norris’s average.
Norris was therefore quickest in both simulated qualifying (on softs) and (medium compound) race runs, but by a smaller amount in the latter. As ever, the Red Bull is taking a little longer to reach its sweet spot than the McLaren in this title-decider, but the progress that Verstappen has made in just two sessions will have McLaren more than aware of the potential scale of battle to come.
The McLaren is always a little prone to front graining and there was evidence of that hovering around on the long runs. But typically as the track rubbers in, the problem will tend to fade.
“I was fairly happy with the car,” said Verstappen. “We just probably needed to be a little bit faster.
“We were in a decent window, but I think still think not quite quick enough. It seems like there is a decent gap that we need to close but we still need to work on the race pace, so let’s see how much we can find overnight. The ride has been tricky and the single laps and long runs need to be a bit better, but let’s see what we can do.”
Long-run averages (all mediums)
Norris 1m29.267s (8 laps)
Verstappen 1m29.698s (13 laps)
Antonelli 1m 29.735s (4 laps)
Piastri 1m 29.741s (6 laps)
Leclerc 1m 29.935s (5 laps)
Russell 1m 30.144s (5 laps)
The other title contender, Oscar Piastri, appeared to be struggling a little, only 11th in the headline times but – more significantly – almost 0.5s slower than Norris in the long runs and trailing slightly behind Verstappen despite fewer laps (and Verstappen’s reported problem).
It would be no surprise to see Piastri turn this around when it matters, but he’s started the weekend on the back foot compared to his two title rivals.
“I think I got there pretty well on the medium, just [on] the soft didn’t get the most out of the grip on that first timed lap,” said Piastri, who handed his car over to Pato O’Ward in FP1. “So finding my feet, I think. Clearly some things to try and improve, but I think after just one session, not too bad.”
George Russell’s low-fuel lap was just a couple of hundredths adrift of Verstappen’s and set at virtually the same time. But the Mercedes’ long-run average trailed significantly behind despite fewer laps. In fact, it was the other Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli which was a closer match to the Red Bull over the race-simulation runs, setting the third-fastest time of the medium runners.
Ferrari is lagging badly on single lap pace – with Charles Leclerc, in the quicker of the red cars, nevertheless behind three of the team’s customers. Ollie Bearman’s Haas went fourth in the headline times, just marginally faster than the Saubers of Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto right behind.
There are more twists and turns to come but, as an opener for a weekend of likely fireworks, this has all the portents of something special.
