The Sochi-like Portimao feature that even has Mercedes puzzled

Formula 1 is going to end up with a lot of data regarding the impact of reduced practice running on its racing spectacle before the 2020 season is over, with a heavily disrupted FP2 session at this weekend's Portuguese Grand Prix following the Friday practice washout at the Nurburgring. The one planned event with a deliberate focus on less practice running remains around the corner - at Imola next weekend...

But the disrupted second session at Portimao on Friday has uniquely intensified the reduced time available to the pack. It's a new F1 race venue to all the teams and drivers, and they're still much more firmly in the learning phase after the two lengthy FP2 red flags delayed proceedings.

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The day had started rather gently, as the drivers took their time to build up to speed on the essentially unfamiliar layout.

Autosport sauntered over to watch the action in FP1 from a small grandstand overlooking the downhill Turn 5 hairpin and, once the early installation running had been completed, the mistakes just rained down as the pack tried to find the limit.

No soft tyres were on display in FP1, as the identical allocation Pirelli provides to all the teams has shifted slightly for this event (as it will also for next month's Turkish GP) and means there is an extra set of hards replacing one set of softs due to the severity of the Portimao layout. Once the drivers had taken fresh rubber, swapping the 'base' tyres always given back after 40 minutes in FP1 to encourage early running, the attacking efforts increased. And so did the mistakes.

It was possible to detect plenty of variation in line and approach when it came to hooking up this hairpin in FP1. The drivers tended to either carry lots of speed on the way in and not bother with the apex, or go in too tight and lose speed avoiding the massive kerb on the inside. It seemed they were spending time learning to balance the two main ways to guarantee good speed on the exit - where Max Verstappen started the session running wide out on the kerbs beyond before pulling in his accelerating line.

The exit's uphill nature helps with traction, so it generally looked simple - but not always. Daniel Ricciardo's Renault was regularly wobbling as he put the power down, but this seemed to improve as the session wore on. In the closing stages, Kimi Raikkonen demonstrated the vulnerability the low-speed turn exposes, when he looped his Alfa Romeo around on an out-lap.

Things calmed again towards the end of FP1, before a tailwind on entry to Turn 5 picked up and caused several deep moments - with Lewis Hamilton among those caught out, but Romain Grosjean and Lance Stroll ending up deepest into the runoff.

"I really struggled to get a good consistent feel for the balance of the car," Nicholas Latifi said of his early experience of Portimao. "It was probably one of the most difficult sessions I have driven in all year."

The slides continued in FP2, where the wind again added to the challenge, with Sebastian Vettel and Daniil Kvyat spinning their Ferrari and AlphaTauri machines around at Turns 14 and 13, respectively. Red Bull's Alex Albon said the track was like an "ice-rink".

"It's not fun out there," he added. "The track is fun, but the grip isn't."

"This type of Tarmac is tricky in terms of getting grip. Once you lose the grip, you can drop the car quite quickly, and I think that's the reason why we have seen so many spins today" Valtteri Bottas

And there's a reason for this - Portimao's surface was completely re-laid ahead of the first Portuguese GP since 1996, with the work only completed last month. The asphalt remains new and shiny - the surface closed up and heavy with bitumen. There is also a lack of laid-down rubber given the recent completion - plus a low amount of support racing taking place this weekend (with only GT Cup and Sports Prototype Cup - the latter featuring six-time Olympic champion and 2015 European Le Mans Series LMP3 champion, Chris Hoy - joining F1 on the bill, running altogether different machinery to the grand prix machines).

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But Mercedes' Valtteri Bottas, who topped both practice sessions, found the situation quite familiar.

"It was quite slippery out on track, it reminded me a lot of when we went to Sochi or Austin for the first time, and we drove on the new Tarmac there," he explained. "This type of Tarmac is tricky in terms of getting grip. Once you lose the grip, you can drop the car quite quickly, and I think that's the reason why we have seen so many spins today.

"The track was evolving lap-by-lap, and it got better throughout the day, but maybe it was reset slightly in between the two sessions, and with red flags in second practice there wasn't that much useful running."

But the action at Portimao on Friday had another similar characteristic to the Russian GP venue in particular: several drivers found that they needed two warm-up laps to get the best grip from the 'soft' tyres - the C3 rubber that has been the medium at seven races so far this season (and once the hard, in Russia, while also the soft at Mugello).

This had quite an impact for F1's two leading teams - quite physically in Red Bull's case.

At Mercedes, Hamilton found it "really difficult to get the tyres in the window on the first lap" but, after he'd taken an extra tour, found his first run on the softs interrupted by a slow AlphaTauri.

Bottas did manage to get a clean lap, the day's fastest at 1m17.940s, but this was set with only one warm-up lap and the team reckoned he could have gone a chunk faster had he taken a second. Hamilton did manage to get a second soft tyre effort in before the second red flag, but lamented his car "felt quite bad".

Bottas ended up 0.595s ahead of Verstappen in the final order, mainly making gains on the straights, which left Mercedes feeling he would have gained further in the corners with warmer tyres given Verstappen's best time was completed on the mediums.

The reason why the Dutchman did not set a flying lap on the softs was that he too had discovered he needed an extra warm-up lap as he followed the Mercedes duo in going for a fast effort after Pierre Gasly's burning AlphaTauri had caused FP2's first stoppage.

After he'd backed off and set about preparing his tyres again, Verstappen was passed by Racing Point's Lance Stroll in the final corners and, at the start of their next laps, they clumsily collided at the Turn 1 apex.

After an investigation, the stewards concluded that "neither driver was wholly or predominantly at fault" as "the incident was the result of a misunderstanding between them and that with hindsight both could have contributed to avoid the incident", and so took no further action. While this seems appropriate given it was a 50-50 incident with no sporting consequence, it was entirely needless - particularly, given he was the car behind, from Verstappen, who's subsequent radio outburst contained utterly unacceptable language.

Not only did the shunt ruin the first true qualifying simulation efforts of the day for the drivers involved, but it also cost all the teams the chance to gather much meaningful long-run data, as Stroll's car had to be removed from the gravel trap where it had come to rest beyond Turn 1.

Mercedes, Haas, Racing Point (with Sergio Perez), Alfa Romeo and Williams were able to log short runs on the soft (with Red Bull getting in one on the mediums and Williams one on the hards), but the short bursts and missing rivals make comparisons even less certain than usual at this stage. For what it's worth, and in a shock development, Mercedes was the fastest - and by some margin - from the small datasets on offer.

"It's a challenging circuit and I believe you'll see some teams and drivers look quick on Saturday and then struggle on Sunday, and vice versa. It will be about making the right compromises to perform strongly across Saturday and Sunday" Sergio Perez

So, all that means that two weeks after being in a largely similar scenario in Germany, F1 is set for another FP3 session where it will be critical for the teams to gather more race data and hope it all comes together before qualifying. At this stage, there is little indication of what is the best tyre to start the race on.

The in-race tyre wear at Sochi was famously very low during its first few races after joining the F1 calendar back in 2014, but the surface at Portimao is expected to clean up as the weekend wears on - even with the lack of normal-level support series running. Plus, the higher energy corners at this venue mean the left-front tyres will take a hefty punishment - as Mercedes endured on a Bottas long run during FP1, where the Finn encountered some graining on the mediums.

But it's not guaranteed that the track will rubber in, with Perez saying after FP2: "The surface is very low grip and it didn't really improve from FP1 into FP2, so I wouldn't expect too much track evolution. It's a challenging circuit and I believe you'll see some teams and drivers look quick on Saturday and then struggle on Sunday, and vice versa. It will be about making the right compromises to perform strongly across Saturday and Sunday. It's all to play for and I'm confident we can be in the mix for good points on Sunday."

In terms of a snapshot of the pecking order based on what little meaningful running was logged, it will surprise no one to learn that Mercedes remains the favourite. It was not even close to being knocked off its perch at the Nurburgring with the minimum practice running, and on Saturday it will have the DAS system back on the W11s - which should provide significant assistance on the tyre warm-up front.

Red Bull came into this weekend buoyed by its performance in Germany thanks to the upgraded RB16, so there will be plenty of attention paid to seeing if it can repeat that form this weekend, ahead of the ever-packed midfield behind.

Williams' George Russell enjoyed his time on the mediums as more rubber went down to take P11 in FP2, but still expects to be fighting "with Haas and the Alfas again" in the race.