George Russell and Charles Leclerc topped two intriguing Formula 1 practice sessions at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, amid a swathe of rookie appearances in FP1 and incidents in FP2.
In total 10 rookies and reserves assumed driving duties during the first of the two timed sessions on Friday as most teams opted to use one of their mandatory ‘young’ driver allowances in the last FP1 session of the year, already restricting track time for half of the 2023 F1 regulars at the Yas Marina Circuit.
A brace of wall-bothering incidents cut down their running even further, as both Carlos Sainz and Nico Hulkenberg crashed in the night-time FP2 to waste a cumulative total of 36 minutes of action as the red flag was produced.
With no representative longer runs on show during the second session, gauging the prospective performance of each car on Sunday would be a fruitless pursuit, but there were otherwise plenty of take-aways from the two Friday sessions among the new faces and token qualifying runs.
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F1’s rookie ruling mandates that each of the 20 race drivers must vacate their seats for a reserve with less than two grand prix starts, and every team bar AlphaTauri elected to use one of their berths at the end of the season.
There were now-familiar faces taking their positions in FP1, as Jack Doohan, Felipe Drugovich, Theo Pourchaire, and Robert Shwartzman assumed their roles as reserve for Alpine, Aston Martin, Alfa Romeo, and Ferrari respectively. They took part in the session alongside McLaren’s IndyCar racer Pato O’Ward, recently announced as one of McLaren’s myriad F1 reserves, Mercedes young driver Frederik Vesti, and Williams junior Zak O’Sullivan. Haas fielded Ferrari youngster Ollie Bearman for the second time, as Red Bull used both seats to hand a drive to junior product Isack Hadjar and current Formula E champion Jake Dennis.
Of the 10, Drugovich found himself highest on the timesheets and ended the hour-long session in second, 0.288s behind Russell. Shwartzman was the other of the rookie drivers in the top 10, having worked his way up to eighth ahead of Pierre Gasly.
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Drugovich impressed out of the total of 10 rookie drivers in FP1 action
Owing to the cooler temperatures produced as the sun had started to set ahead of second practice, conditions were more consistent with Sunday’s race and thus created a more representative window for the drivers to dial in their…
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