The Friday practice sessions have each been cut to one hour in 2021, instead of the usual 90 minutes each. Verstappen topped both of them, ahead of Pierre Gasly (AlphaTauri) in FP1 and McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo in FP2.

Styrian Grand Prix FP1 results: Verstappen fastest from Gasly

Cla	Driver	Chassis	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h
1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	34	1'05.910			235.848
2	Pierre Gasly	AlphaTauri	32	1'06.166	0.256	0.256	234.936
3	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	32	1'06.332	0.422	0.166	234.348
4	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	34	1'06.386	0.476	0.054	234.157
5	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	36	1'06.397	0.487	0.011	234.119
6	Fernando Alonso	Alpine	35	1'06.519	0.609	0.122	233.689
7	Esteban Ocon	Alpine	35	1'06.551	0.641	0.032	233.577
8	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	33	1'06.584	0.674	0.033	233.461
9	Antonio Giovinazzi	Alfa Romeo	29	1'06.614	0.704	0.030	233.356
10	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	36	1'06.629	0.719	0.015	233.303
11	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Ferrari	33	1'06.630	0.720	0.001	233.300
12	Daniel Ricciardo	McLaren	38	1'06.669	0.759	0.039	233.163
13	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	33	1'06.696	0.786	0.027	233.069
14	Sebastian Vettel	Aston Martin	32	1'06.708	0.798	0.012	233.027
15	George Russell	Williams	31	1'06.848	0.938	0.140	232.539
16	Lando Norris	McLaren	35	1'06.861	0.951	0.013	232.494
17	Nicholas Latifi	Williams	31	1'07.180	1.270	0.319	231.390
18	Mick Schumacher	Haas	30	1'07.473	1.563	0.293	230.385
19	Robert Kubica	Alfa Romeo	30	1'07.823	1.913	0.350	229.196
20	Nikita Mazepin	Haas	31	1'08.081	2.171	0.258	228.328
View full results

What happened in Free Practice 1?

Verstappen set the medium-tyred benchmark at 1m06.511s, before the soft tyres runs began around the halfway point. Carlos Sainz spun his Ferrari at Turn 1, blocking the pitlane as Bottas wanted to leave on his new soft tyres.

Using softs, Hamilton took P1 with 1m06.390s, which was quickly beaten – by 0.004s – by Bottas. Hamilton then went fastest again on his second push lap on 1m06.332s.

AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly took a turn at the top with a lap of 1m06.166s, just before Verstappen set his session-best 1m05.910s. Bottas was on a faster lap but ran too wide at the final corner, losing a chunk of time and had his lap deleted for track limits anyway.

Gasly stayed second, a quarter of a second behind Verstappen, with Hamilton in third, 0.054s ahead of Bottas. Yuki Tsunoda was fifth in the second AlphaTauri.

The Alpines of Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon were sixth and seventh respectively, ahead of Lance Stroll (Aston Martin), Antonio Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo) and the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Sainz. Sergio Perez spun his Red Bull at Turn 4 and was only 13^th fastest.

Robert Kubica drove Kimi Raikkonen’s car in this session, and spun at Turn 3 early on, but he was still faster than Haas’s Nikita Mazepin.

Styrian Grand Prix FP2 results: Verstappen fastest from Ricciardo

Cla	Driver	Chassis	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h
1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	37	1'05.412			237.644
2	Daniel Ricciardo	McLaren	35	1'05.748	0.336	0.336	236.430
3	Esteban Ocon	Alpine	35	1'05.790	0.378	0.042	236.279
4	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	35	1'05.796	0.384	0.006	236.257
5	Fernando Alonso	Alpine	39	1'05.827	0.415	0.031	236.146
6	Sebastian Vettel	Aston Martin	38	1'05.934	0.522	0.107	235.763
7	Lando Norris	McLaren	39	1'05.994	0.582	0.060	235.548
8	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	36	1'06.079	0.667	0.085	235.245
9	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	36	1'06.089	0.677	0.010	235.210
10	Antonio Giovinazzi	Alfa Romeo	37	1'06.145	0.733	0.056	235.010
11	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Ferrari	39	1'06.147	0.735	0.002	235.003
12	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	32	1'06.251	0.839	0.104	234.634
13	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	39	1'06.270	0.858	0.019	234.567
14	Kimi Raikkonen	Alfa Romeo	41	1'06.297	0.885	0.027	234.472
15	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	39	1'06.451	1.039	0.154	233.928
16	George Russell	Williams	39	1'06.628	1.216	0.177	233.307
17	Mick Schumacher	Haas	29	1'06.886	1.474	0.258	232.407
18	Nikita Mazepin	Haas	30	1'07.404	1.992	0.518	230.621
19	Nicholas Latifi	Williams	32	1'07.669	2.257	0.265	229.718
20	Pierre Gasly	AlphaTauri	0
View full results

What happened in Free Practice 2?

In FP2, Verstappen set the initial pace on hard tyres at 1m06.722s as rain drops began to fall on a dry track. Alonso beat that time on medium tyres, with 1m06.651s.

With spots of rain and a strong tailwind, Perez locked up and ran wide at Turn 3 and doing likewise were Verstappen and Hamilton. Meanwhile, Sainz spun into the gravel and escaped at Turn 4.

Hamilton then went to the top, setting his 1m06.358s on hard tyres, until Verstappen beat him with 1m06.192s as the rain threat abated.

Bottas went early with his soft-tyre run but failed to beat Verstappen’s lap. Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll leapt to the head of the times on 1m06.192s on soft rubber, which was beaten by teammate Sebastian Vettel on 1m05.934s.

Hamilton was next to try softs, going top on 1m05.796s, before Ocon beat that by 0.006s with 1m05.790s.

Hamilton went fastest again on 1m05.335s, but this lap was deleted due to exceeding track limits at the final corner, so Verstappen’s next lap of 1m05.412s proved to be the quickest of the day.

Ricciardo was second fastest – three tenths off Verstappen’s pace – ahead of Ocon, Hamilton, Alonso, Vettel, Lando Norris (McLaren), Stroll, Perez and Antonio Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo).

Bottas was only 12th, sandwiched by the Ferraris, and his day went from bad to worse when he spun exiting his pit box on fresh hard tyres – fortunately without hitting anything or anyone. The McLaren mechanics, who were out in the pitlane at the time, helped him reverse and rejoin.

Elsewhere, Mazepin spun at Turn 4 and rejoined, while FP1 star Gasly had an issue with his power unit and watched the entire session from pitwall.

The threatened rainstorm never arrived, allowing teams to complete their race simulation runs until the chequered flag.