When the teams and drivers envisioned racing in the desert oasis that is Las Vegas city, they probably did not have parka coats and woolly hats in mind as their attire of choice.
But the paddock is learning Nevada in November is barely different from Silverstone in spring.
It’s too early to say whether Formula 1 has succeeded in its efforts to make the Las Vegas Grand Prix the coolest event on the calendar. But it’s certainly the coldest.
The opening Friday – sorry, Thursday – of the second event around the six-kilometre Las Vegas Strip Circuit was supposed to be another demonstration of the unparalleled performance of Formula 1 and its cars as they shot down the straight at huge speeds before flying around the track’s modest collection of twists and turns. But by the end of the two practice sessions, the drivers’ assessments of the circuit were unlikely to be quoted on any promotional material for next year’s race:
“It’s like driving on ice,” one shivered. “Really slippery, really dirty,” remarked another. “I feel like I could drive a road car quicker than we drive at the minute,” said a third.
If drivers were hoping that this year’s second race in Vegas would be grippier than the last year’s, that hope died halfway around their first laps out of the pits. But despite the low surface temperature and a coating of dust along most of the track surface, all 20 drivers avoided any major mistakes over the first two hours of running.
In their pursuit of Max Verstappen since the summer break, street circuits have been McLaren’s strength. Oscar Piastri took a brilliant victory in Baku before Lando Norris defeated Red Bull comprehensively at the next round in Singapore.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
Therefore it was fair to expect they would arrive in the USA for the final time this season as the favourites once again – even if they had lost out on a grand prix victory last time in COTA and even in the most recent round in Brazil. But Norris was just one-hundredth of a second off the best time of the day, with Lewis Hamilton claiming that honour for Mercedes after having been fastest in the opening session earlier in the night.
There were some caveats to Hamilton’s performance, however. Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri, two drivers many would have expected to be able to offer a challenge to Hamilton’s…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at RaceFans…