Red Bull matches Mercedes in Silverstone sun but cooling conditions could widen gap

Formula 1 fans may be missing from the 2020 British Grand Prix, but the usual Silverstone cliches still apply. The wind was strong at the former Royal Air Force base and the sun - admittedly not always a feature here - blazed down.

But the combination of the two, and particularly the prediction that conditions will be significantly cooler for the rest of the weekend, hung over all of the data the teams gathered on Friday.

The key to Friday's running was coping with the conditions. The sun scorched the track, which Pirelli says hasn't matured much since it was re-laid ahead of last year's grand prix due to the absence of track action amid the UK's coronavirus lockdown, and the wind meant the drivers struggled with handling.

Across the grid, with all the usual caveats about practice fuel loads and engine modes applying, the teams will be intrigued to know if the outlier conditions on Friday have artificially impacted their positions for the rest of the event.

Up front, both Mercedes and Red Bull have reasons to be disappointed. The dominant championship-leading squad was off its usual perch at the head of the overall times, and neither Lewis Hamilton nor Valtteri Bottas was happy with the balance of their respective W11s. At Red Bull, Alex Albon's mid-FP2 crash dampened his sizzling, second-fastest time in that session.

But it seems as if Red Bull goes into the Friday night analysis sessions with at least one significant reason to be cheerful. Once the red flag period for Albon's crash had ended, the teams switched to the usual FP2 long-run data gathering, and it was during these runs that a positive picture emerged for the team.

Medium tyre long-run average pace

1. Mercedes 1:31.820 (12 laps)
2. Red Bull 1:31.835 (8 laps)
3. McLaren 1:32.425 (12 laps)
4. AlphaTauri 1:32.850 (11 laps)
5. Haas 1:33.293 (7 laps)
6. Ferrari 1:33.297 (14 laps)
7. Alfa Romeo 1:33.575 (17 laps)
8. Williams 1:34.109 (16 laps)
*Racing Point and Renault N/A

On the long-run medium tyre averages, Verstappen practically matched Bottas's leading time on the same rubber, which is much better for the race considering the considerable degradation the teams encountered on the softs. That said, there is an immediate caveat to consider, as Verstappen's stint was four laps shorter.

Red Bull has introduced a new rear wing for this race as part of an update package, which team boss Christian Horner says is "a direct reaction to what we saw in the data and from the feedback we had in Hungary" - where even Mercedes was shocked at how far the two squads were apart. Verstappen's verdict on these parts was positive.

"We keep developing and bringing new parts to the car and they seem like they are working a bit better, so I'm happy with that and the direction," he said, despite ending up only 14th in FP2 after encountering a slow Romain Grosjean on his soft-tyre flying effort.

Staying with the weather, the bad news for Red Bull is that if Mercedes is having to make changes to run in the hotter temperatures - as it did during the 2019 Austrian GP - then this possible necessity is removed for the rest of the weekend

Mercedes feels "we don't have the same pace advantage that we had in Budapest", per its trackside engineering director, Andrew Shovlin, and that it is yet to get its car in the right window.

But there are possible reasons why it is down on overall pace (below) - including suggestions it ran a more conservative engine mode on its flying laps (Bottas's time was also slightly compromised by traffic) compared to its rivals: Stroll's Racing Point and Albon's Red Bull. Ferrari, which split the Mercedes drivers with Charles Leclerc, may also have been running more power on its qualifying simulation effort compared to Mercedes.

Overall fastest teams times

1. Racing Point (Stroll) 1:27.274
2. Red Bull (Albon) 1:27.364
3. Mercedes (Bottas) 1:27.431
4. Ferrari (Leclerc) 1:27.570
5. McLaren (Sainz) 1:27.820
6. AlphaTauri (Gasly) 1:27.997
7. Renault (Ricciardo) 1:28.112
8. Alfa Romeo (Raikkonen) 1:28.159
9. Haas (Grosjean) 1:28.564
10. Williams (Russell) 1:28.771

The temperature factor also shouldn't be ignored in Mercedes' performance on Friday afternoon, as it had to open out its cooling as a result of the fierce, 37-degree sunshine. But there remains a sense that it is yet to get to a happy place with car handling, with the team trying two different ride height configurations in FP2 to try and get a better idea of the right way to go for the rest of the weekend.

"It was quite a difficult day to be honest," said Hamilton. "The balance didn't feel quite right, and the wind made things really tricky out there today. We're going to work on it tonight and try to figure out why I haven't been feeling as comfortable as I would like. It's been a hard day of driving, but it's not a disaster."

Staying with the weather, the bad news for Red Bull is that if Mercedes is having to make changes to run in the hotter temperatures - as it did during the 2019 Austrian GP - then this possible necessity is removed for the rest of the weekend. There are also suggestions cooler conditions will widen the gaps between teams as the tyre management process will become very different. For example, significant blistering was encountered on Friday, which may not be repeated when the mercury comes down on Saturday.

Racing Point should be very pleased with its practice-leading pace - but it has shone well early in the weekend at the opening races of the season before not quite holding on as the opposition steps up. It was also beaten by Mercedes and Renault in the hard tyre averages (only applicable to six teams) on Friday afternoon.

Leclerc suspected a "radical approach with our downforce level" boosted him on one-lap pace today, with the suspected engine power mode advantage also to consider when looking at Ferrari's times. He added that this "seems to pay off in quali, but it doesn't in the race", and this is backed up by the averages.

Of the four teams to gather meaningful long-run data on the softs, Ferrari was the slowest on 1m34.368s, compared to Alfa Romeo's best at 1m33:277s. But the gap to Mercedes in the medium averages is alarming, with the team giving away 1.477s on a similar length stint.

The times were close across the field on Friday, with McLaren looking like it is currently edging the classic, tight midfield scrap. But AlphaTauri is also showing great form, as it sits above Renault in the one-lap overall classification and the medium tyre averages. Renault has had its issues with cooling so far this season, albeit related to a specific radiator weld from a supplier, but in any case it improves compared to AlphaTauri on the hard tyres - where only Mercedes (1m32.176s vs Renault's 1m32.725s) was better in FP2.

At the back, Alfa Romeo looks in good shape over one lap and on the soft tyres, but it falls well back on the mediums. This should encourage Haas, but it shouldn't get too carried away as, like Verstappen, Grosjean's stint was short compared to other drivers on that compound.

Williams is "a bit closer to our competitors than we feared [we would be]," according to George Russell. The team feels Silverstone doesn't suit the FW43 as well as the Hungaroring did last time out. But even though it brings up the rear of the field overall, the 1.497s spread across the field should provide encouragement. Williams looks good on the hards compared to its immediate rivals - Alfa Romeo (which shone on the unfancied softs and took eighth in the teams' one-lap stakes) and Haas - but less good when it came to the mediums.

Like Silverstone's airfield nature, the British weather is quite a cliche. But its seems that just as the UK recorded its hottest day of the year so far, that won't last - and the expected temperature change indeed could provide a very different picture come the rest of the weekend.

In fact, Renault notes there is a "40% chance of rain on Saturday afternoon", while Alfa Romeo says "tomorrow may well be wetter than your average Glastonbury festival"...