F1 Miami GP Live Commentary and Updates - FP1 & FP2
Friday's action from the fifth round of the 2023 Formula 1 season.
Live AppleTV Race Audio
F1 heads to Miami this weekend for round five of the 2023 championship, with Max Verstappen leading the standings from team-mate Sergio Perez.
The Mexican driver won both races during the Baku sprint weekend despite Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc taking pole.
Verstappen will be hoping to repeat his win on Miami's street circuit from last year, as well as continuing Red Bull's 100% success rate so far this year.
The weekend returns to its usual format in the US, with two free practice sessions on Friday, FP3 and qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday.
FP1 starts at 7pm BST on Friday, with FP2 at 10:30pm.
Live Standings
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Summary
Summary:
Verstappen led FP2 for F1's Miami GP
Sainz finished second, with Leclerc third despite a late crash which prompted a red flag
Russell topped FP1 despite missing most of the session with a steering issue
With that, we'll call time on our live text coverage of Friday practice in Miami. Final practice begins at 5:30pm BST tomorrow, with qualifying scheduled for 9pm BST. Until then, have a lovely rest of your Friday. Go well!
Verstappen is the driver to beat once again with a best lap time of 1m27.930s to put him 0.385s up on nearest challenger Sainz. It looked to be a good session for Ferrari until Leclerc found the wall late on.
But there was still enough time for Sainz to almost trip over both McLarens, while Perez suffered a huge lock-up into Turn 1. So not the cleanest end to the session.
Replays show that Leclerc caught a slide through Turn 7 but locking up his momentum takes him into the barrier. He is out of the car and all OK, but his front-right of the car is wrecked.
"I think it's three wheeling through the left-hander, Turn 2," Russell reports over team radio. That's not what you want, having had that same experience in a Mini. I'm sure it is the same feeling...
After a Mercedes 1-2 in first practice, we've not seen much of them in this session. Hamilton is seventh and Russell is 17th - the latter 1.5s off the outright pace.
FIA technical delegate Jo Bauer has been down to Red Bull to check on Verstappen after he had a headrest switch having complained about his Hans helmet device.
McLaren fans will be shouting to stop the count right about now, with Norris leading a team 1-2 ahead of Piastri. Sadly, it may not last with lots of others switching to the soft tyres.
Perez has been shown the black and white flag for crossing the line at pit entry. He'll largely be fine doing that in practice, more of a don't do it again, but in the race he'll be in hot water.
"Oh my goodness!" Perez says over team radio, as he avoids de Vries going slow and nearly clatters into the outside wall. That could have been very messy.
How Magnussen didn't have a bigger accident is a minor miracle. Replays show the Dane going through a full 180 at Turns 14 and 15 and only lightly touches the wall on the left-front. That could have been session over.
But here come the Red Bulls, as Verstappen leads a 1-2 from team-mate Perez at the top of the times. The Dutch driver's 1m30.146s puts him six-tenths clear.
