What we learned from Friday practice at the Spanish Grand Prix

You could forgive George Russell for taking a step back and admiring his soft-tyre lap. Amid the customary FP2 hot laps set in preparation for this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix, his effort had been left relatively untouched by championship protagonists Lando Norris and Max Verstappen.

Russell had bustled over the line, clutching an impressive 1m13.046s in hand, while both Norris and Verstappen had just missed the Briton's benchmark having both set identical 1m13.070s on their gambits with the soft tyre. Just as Russell proverbially stood arms akimbo, satisfied with his work, Oscar Piastri stirred. The championship leader fired a 1m12.760s across the line, an early shot across the bows of anyone seeking to close in on the Australian's points lead. Of course, it's only FP2, but Piastri's almost-three-tenth gap to the next-fastest driver represented a significant advantage. 

In a weekend defined in the lead-up by the changes to the flexure tests governing the front wing designs, the usual paddock tattle seemed to decree that McLaren's wings would be, quite literally, clipped. A theoretical disadvantage was attributed to the Woking squad owing to the reduced scope to exploit the field of aeroelasticity, although the team denied that this would really have much effect. That said, although almost every team had to beef up their front wings to fit the new 10mm maximum in flex per the FIA's testing procedures, most also denied that they would be compromised.

Piastri's time cannot be viewed as a complete indication that McLaren will continue to deliver with or without a flexing front wing, but it should at least partly refute some of the suggestions that the MCL39 will be one of the cars most affected. Besides, deleting the degree of flex present in the front wings doesn't automatically confer a pace disadvantage in any case - it just simply makes it more difficult for teams to find balance between top-end speed and cornering performance. It is possible for the teams to dial their way back in 'organically' with set-up.

Either way, the early one-lap pace suggests that McLaren is very much in the hunt here, but Mercedes and Red Bull should also find themselves in the battle for pole position. After all, Red Bull has been out of the count on multiple occasions after Friday's running, but found its way back into contention with overnight set-up changes and simulator exploration - so, with a better baseline, it should theoretically match up. The RB21 should be strong at Barcelona, after all; the car grips up well in the long-radius, medium-speed corners and holds onto that downforce with a vice-like grip. 

Mercedes should be a little bit more in the game for qualifying after a dismal opening two-thirds to this current triple header, as the circuit is a little more conventional. The question if the W16s can deal with the heat in qualifying will remain unanswered until then; Friday practice suggests that the silver machines aren't in a bad spot, but it depends how the C3s hang on in the final two corners as the times start to wind into the 1m11s - or even below.

A technical directive has been imposed for this weekend's race, so teams have revamped their wings as shown with Mercedes above

Ferrari? The jury is very much out here; Charles Leclerc was present among the top five (albeit half a second off Piastri's pace) but Lewis Hamilton struggled and found himself in 11th, another quarter-of-a-second behind his team-mate. It's not hugely encouraging at this juncture, however.

Softs versus mediums - teams explore two-stop potential

Many of the teams weighed up both the medium and the soft tyre on the longer runs through FP2, perhaps in an effort to explore the idea of running to a two-stop strategy. Most teams gathered some degree of a representative long run on softs, barring Haas (since Oliver Bearman was sidelined through most of the session with floor damage having skated across the gravel early on) and Alpine (both Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto did only very short stints on the soft). 

Soft tyre times

(Alpine and Haas did not do representative stints)

Verstappen certainly put the hard yards in through practice, logging both an acceptably long stint on both mediums and softs. The Dutchman showed strong pace on both compounds, suggesting that Red Bull is in a good place with its management of the tyre over a stint. 

Racing Bulls looks set to achieve the much-coveted 'best of the rest' title; Lawson's soft stint looked strong and only within a couple of tenths of Leclerc's best on the red-walled tyre, and its front-end updates have been comprehensive enough to mitigate any effect of the flexi-wing changes made for this round

The team's Imola updates, introduced to address overall load and attempt to follow McLaren's lead with heat management at the rear tyres, appears to be so far producing the goods. As mentioned, the RB21 is a strong performer at circuits like Barcelona, although the worry has largely been related to how it maintains that performance deep into a race when tyre performance and thermal degradation start to take effect. Its performance over Imola eclipsed that of McLaren, demonstrating that the car can play the role required when conditions are favourable.

McLaren's soft-tyre times aren't far away over a stint, but Norris' current 0.3s-per-lap deficit over a similar stint length might be some cause for concern. Factors such as fuel load and engine mode are always in consideration here but, even if the MCL39 was being run low-and-slow to simply collect the data over FP2, it surely cannot be too happy with the timing charts. Nonetheless, the soft degradation didn't seem too bad.

Piastri's long-run average on the mediums looks concerning, but perhaps that's artificially so; the Australian did by far the longest stint on the yellow-walled tyre, almost double that of Verstappen. He also started carrying less speed through the longer-radius corners at the end of the first sector and the start of the second, sapping at his time, so there's reason to suggest that he was backing off slightly to manage the stint.

Verstappen appears the strongest on a soft tyre

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images via Getty Images

Ferrari's race pace on softs seemed to be about 0.4-0.5s behind Red Bull and McLaren, while Russell's mammoth soft-tyre stint put the Mercedes driver lower in the stakes as he bore the brunt of the tyre deg. As such, his 17-lap run on the C3s has heavy caveats associated with its average time.

So, the Mercedes pace appears to be inconclusive at this time; both drivers ran long on the softs and did nothing representative on the mediums to show where the car stacks up this weekend. Likewise, McLaren has a couple of question marks situated apropos of its stints. Everyone does, really, but these two seem like the biggest outliers.

Medium tyre times

(Mercedes, Alpine, Racing Bulls, and Aston Martin did not do representative stints)

Of the midfielders, Racing Bulls looks set to achieve the much-coveted 'best of the rest' title; Lawson's soft stint looked strong and only within a couple of tenths of Leclerc's best on the red-walled tyre, and its front-end updates have been comprehensive enough to mitigate any effect of the flexi-wing changes made for this round. Sporting director Alan Permane suggested that the nose changes were "80%" driven by the technical directive, with the other 20% an iterative development of its early-season package.

Aston Martin had troubles, but Fernando Alonso's soft-tyre stint pace was very reasonable; however, the team was unable to back-to-back it with Lance Stroll as the Canadian was garage-bound for much of the session. Williams, on the other hand, expected its current struggles. The FW47 likes short-radius corners, which Barcelona has very few of - and the team had trialled this before the weekend. Continuing the streak of double-points finishes looks like an arduous task as it stands.

Pirelli believes that, following FP2 stints, that a two-stopper is very much on the cards. "On this very abrasive surface, managing thermal degradation on the rear axle will be one of the key factors on Sunday," said chief engineer Simone Berra. 

"In order to try and protect the rear tyres, the teams will have to pay particular attention to car balance, as there’s a risk of increasing the stress on the fronts, especially the left side. With this scenario, if one wants to extend the stint a lot, then tyre wear must be taken into account, always paying particular attention to the front left, which is put under significant stress. If we already look ahead to Sunday, its relatively easy to hypothesise that we will see a similar scenario to last year’s race, with the medium and soft as protagonists of a two-stop race.”

The hard tyre was only used very sparingly in FP2, as Franco Colapinto was the only driver to complete any extended stint on the C1s - which suggests that the teams will attempt to avoid it if they can.

A two-stop strategy is a strong possibility for Sunday's race, with the soft and medium tyres expected to be the most popular

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images via Getty Images