Sainz quickest as technical trouble hits rookies in first practice

Carlos Sainz Jnr put Ferrari fastest at the end of the first practice session for the Mexican Grand Prix as technical problems affected many in the field.

Sainz’s best time of a 1’20.707 was half a tenth quicker than team mate Charles Leclerc, with the two Red Bulls of Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen third and fourth having set identical times to each other.

It was a clear, warm start to the weekend at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, with temperatures sitting in the mid-20C range as the cars spilled out onto the circuit.

There were five stand-in drivers taking part in the opening hour, with F2 driver Jack Doohan getting his first run in a grand prix session in Esteban Ocon’s Alpine. Pietro Fittipaldi took over Kevin Magnussen’s Haas, Nyck de Vries stepped into George Russell’s Mercedes, Liam Lawson got a drive in Yuki Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri and Logan Sargeant returned to drive future team mate Alexander Albon’s Williams.

There was a rush out onto the clear circuit, with teams wasting no time to get out on track. Leclerc’s first run out was ended early when his team called him in due to a puncture, while Lawson had a shock at the end of the main straight when his brakes reportedly failed, forcing him to return back to the garage.

There were also problems for local favourite Perez who was delayed with bodywork damage to his Red Bull, while Daniel Ricciardo was side-lined by braking problems which required McLaren to pull apart his car to try and fix. Mick Schumacher’s car also received attention on its rear wing for an apparently problem with the DRS flap.

World champion Verstappen set the early pace on a 1’22.291 on the hard compound tyres ahead of team mate Perez. After having his punctured hard tyres replaced, Leclerc was sent out on soft tyres and went comfortably fastest with a 1’20.753 as many others began to switch to the softer compound.

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Red Bull headed out onto the track with soft tyres for the first time, but Verstappen’s first flying lap was ruined when he spun at turn nine. Sainz went fastest of all on the soft tyres with a 1’20.707 just under half a tenth ahead of his team mate, before the two Red Bulls went third and fourth for Perez and Verstappen, respectively, after Verstappen’s second attempt at a flying lap.

The session was temporarily halted when Fittipaldi was told to stop his Haas in the second corner. After a delay of five minutes, the session eventually resumed but without Doohan, whose session was ended by Alpine after detecting anomalies in his power unit data.

There were no improvements at the front of the order in the final minutes of the session, until Lawson pulled off the circuit at the entrance to the stadium section in the final sector. With his AlphaTauri’s brakes smoking heavily, his left-front brake assembly caught fire after Lawson vacated the car until it was put out by a marshal’s fire extinguisher. The session was red-flagged a second time, but with under four minutes remaining, it was not resumed.

That left Sainz as quickest for the first session of the weekend, less than a tenth of a second ahead of team mate Leclerc. Perez was third, a tenth behind Sainz, with Verstappen fourth having set an identical time to his team mate.

Lewis Hamilton ended the session in fifth, ahead of Fernando Alonso, Valtteri Bottas and Lando Norris. Pierre Gasly and Sebastian Vettel rounded out the top the.

All five stand-in drivers occupied the final five spots on the timing screen. However for those of them hoping to add to their FIA superlicence tallies – none of them reached the 24 laps necessary collect the bonus point for covering 100 kilometres of running.

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2022 Mexican Grand Prix first practice result

Position	Number	Driver	Team	Model	Time	Gap	Laps
1	55	Carlos Sainz Jnr	Ferrari	F1-75	1’20.707		25
2	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	F1-75	1’20.753	0.046	20
3	11	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	RB18	1’20.827	0.120	22
4	1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	RB18	1’20.827	0.120	22
5	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	W13	1’20.849	0.142	17
6	14	Fernando Alonso	Alpine-Renault	A522	1’20.899	0.192	26
7	77	Valtteri Bottas	Alfa Romeo-Ferrari	C42	1’21.083	0.376	23
8	4	Lando Norris	McLaren-Mercedes	MCL36	1’21.120	0.413	21
9	10	Pierre Gasly	AlphaTauri-Red Bull	AT03	1’21.310	0.603	25
10	5	Sebastian Vettel	Aston Martin-Mercedes	AMR22	1’21.525	0.818	24
11	3	Daniel Ricciardo	McLaren-Mercedes	MCL36	1’21.762	1.055	16
12	24	Zhou Guanyu	Alfa Romeo-Ferrari	C42	1’21.820	1.113	20
13	18	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin-Mercedes	AMR22	1’21.865	1.158	24
14	47	Mick Schumacher	Haas-Ferrari	VF-22	1’21.952	1.245	22
15	6	Nicholas Latifi	Williams-Mercedes	FW44	1’22.912	2.205	20
16	40	Liam Lawson	AlphaTauri-Red Bull	AT03	1’23.861	3.154	19
17	45	Logan Sargeant	Williams-Mercedes	FW44	1’24.246	3.539	22
18	19	Nyck De Vries	Mercedes	W13	1’24.582	3.875	20
19	82	Jack Doohan	Alpine-Renault	A522	1’24.615	3.908	13
20	51	Pietro Fittipaldi	Haas-Ferrari	VF-22	1’26.766	6.059	9

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