Leclerc pips Sainz to top spot, Ricciardo crashes out

Charles Leclerc was fastest in FP2 for the Monaco Grand Prix, lapping just four hundredths of a second faster than his team-mate Carlos Sainz in what appeared to be an encouraging session for the Scuderia.

The Ferrari drivers held a healthy gap to Red Bull pair Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen, with the former going 0.379s slower than Leclerc in their qualifying simulations.

McLaren’s Lando Norris repeated his FP1 result by rounding out the top five but his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo had an abrupt exit from the session, crashing out after losing control of his car in the Swimming Pool section of the circuit under a quick direction change.

FP1 was largely a scouting mission for the drivers as they built up their confidence to attack the tight, demanding Monaco layout – but FP2 would be the first acid test for how their qualifying pace could be on Saturday.

The majority of the drivers came straight out on track to get more laps under their belts – understandably, with Monaco being widely known as having the least forgiving layout on the calendar.

One man in desperate need of track time was Valtteri Bottas, who was unable to set a flying lap in FP1 after the team discovered an issue that meant they needed to remove his power unit and investigate.

That remained the case in the first part of second practice, but the Finn was finally able to emerge around 10 minutes in – at which time both Red Bulls were top of the timesheet, Perez on a 1:14.001 leading the way, two-and-a-half tenths ahead of Verstappen.

But the Aston Martin mechanics will have been wincing at the sight of Sebastian Vettel losing grip out of the first part of the Swimming Pool section. The German lost the rear of his car going through the left-right flick and missed the wall on the outside by mere millimetres.

But moments later, the red flag was out as Ricciardo was not quite so lucky through the same section of the circuit. The rear of his McLaren lost grip as he flicked his car to the right,…