F1 British GP Live Commentary and Updates – FP1 & FP2

Other than Tsunoda, who spun off on his sixth lap, Hadjar has completed the fewest laps of anybody so far and is adrift from the rest of the pack with a best time so far of 1m36.046s. Can the Frenchman unleash some eye-catching times as we inch towards the end of the hour-long session?

Bottas is the latest driver on the softs and bags a 1m28.527s to move into sixth in his Sauber. But he's quickly shuffled back a place as Stroll leaps up to fifth in his Aston Martin which is fitted with a set of the yellow sidewalled medium tyres.

With Tsunoda's session coming to an early end, impetus will be on Ricciardo for RB to get through its run plans to understand the impact changing set-up items will have. The Australian is 12th in the timesheets for now. 

Piastri meanwhile moves into fourth, ahead of Leclerc, while Sainz shoves Bearman down to seventh. All aside from the Haas driver have set their times on hards thus far.

It's not quite enough for Bearman to reach the outright summit, but taking those softs moves the Haas young gun up to fifth on a 1m28.660s. 

Bearman is the first driver to bolt on a set of the softs. Could we see him shooting to the top of the times shortly?

For reference, Hadjar is 11 points shy of F2 points leader Paul Aron, who was until last year part of the Mercedes junior scheme. Colapinto is fifth, while Bearman is 14th - but had to miss the Jeddah races due to that remarkable call-up to replace Sainz at Ferrari.

This writer remembers seeing Hadjar at the Winfield Racing School in February 2019 when aged 14 he won a free entry to the final F4 round of the year as his prize. Now a title contender in F2, he's come a long way. And grown a bit in statute too.

Of the F2 regulars, Bearman is currently best-placed in tenth, with Hadjar and Colapinto yet to set a representative laptime. Doohan, who doesn't have to combine racing in F1's main support category any longer, is currently 13th.

Norris is taking things easy at the start of this session with an array of scaffolding mounted to his car. This allows teams to attach sensors that they wouldn't ordinarily be able to run.

Colapinto isn't the only rookie lined up for FP1. Jack Doohan gets his latest go at the wheel of an Alpine, in for Pierre Gasly, Isack Hadjar takes over Sergio Perez's Red Bull and Oliver Bearman assumes the wheel of the Haas usually driven by Kevin Magnussen.

If Verstappen is to secure back-to-back British GP wins, then he'll need floor updates brought by his Red Bull team to perform well. You can read about those here. Ferrari doesn't have new parts here, but hopes the return to a more conventional weekend format here will help it to better understand the upgrades introduced in Spain that have not appeared to bring the desired improvement. Here's more on that.

Plenty has happened of course in F1 over the past week, not least the recriminations over the contact between Max Verstappen and Lando Norris last week at the Red Bull Ring. Norris has since back-tracked on his demand for an apology from the Red Bull rival, while the Dutchman has doubled down on his disinterest in criticism, stating his only priority is maintaining his friendship with the McLaren driver. Will Silverstone bring the latest instalment in a battle that has become ever more intense in recent weeks?

Everyone has their own personal favourite memories of watching F1 at Silverstone. The 2001 race is one of my earliest as a racing fan, but one seared in my brain as Mika Hakkinen charged to victory. And for sheer drama, little can top the 2020 race when Lewis Hamilton suffered a puncture on the final lap to score his seventh win (of eight) at the British GP. Toto Wolff's recollections of that day feature in another special feature looking back on Hamilton's magic moments at Silverstone that you can read here.

Silverstone back then bore little similarity with today's circuit, which poses a tricky challenge for teams to master its combination of high and low-speed corners. If you want to dig into the set-up compromises involved for nailing a lap here, then look no further than our sister title GP Racing's interview with Aston Martin's performance director Tom McCullough.

We're a little under 20 minutes away from the start of first practice at the venue which hosted Formula 1 for the first time back in 1950, in the very first world championship event. Giuseppe Farina was the winner that day in an Alfa Romeo 158 by 2.6s over team-mate Luigi Fagioli in what turned out to be a podium sweep for the Italian marque completed by Reg Parnell.

Good afternoon and welcome to Autosport's live text coverage from a rather grey and overcast Silverstone. In short, typical British weather.