Piastri stays ahead in second Imola practice

Oscar Piastri ended Friday practice fastest at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix by once again besting McLaren teammate Lando Norris to the top spot.

Piastri immediately rocketed to top spot with his first flying lap on softs, logging a best time of 1m15.293s. Norris, who had just completed what would be his quickest lap, found himself eclipsed by just 0.025s, down from his 0.032s deficit in FP1.

But both McLaren drivers will feel they left time on the table. Piastri set purple times in the first two sectors on his fastest lap but had to thread himself through a gaggle of slower cars at the final two corners to complete the lap. The Australian had been 0.267s up on Norris at the end of the second sector, with traffic costing him more than 0.2s.

While Norris’ fastest lap looked clean enough, a second attempt on the same set of tires yielded more time. He improved his result in the first sector and pinched the purple time in the second split to put himself roughly equal with Piastri, but a slide through Rivazza forced him to abandon the lap.

Despite the imperfections, neither McLaren driver was troubled by the rest of the pack, with Pierre Gasly next in the order at 0.276s off the pace. The Alpine driver demonstrated impressive pace, losing time only in the fast first sector and matching Piastri through the more technical second and third splits.

George Russell was foremost among the frontrunners in fourth, but the Mercedes driver was 0.4s off the pace. Briton led a tight group of would-be race contenders, with Max Verstappen 0.042s further back in fifth and Charles Leclerc 0.075s slower than the Mercedes on his way to sixth. Verstappen lamented his car bottoming out through Acque Minerali, while Leclerc reported he his brakes felt “horrendous” and that he was suffering from problems on entry at the same turn plus into Villeneuve and Piratella.

Isack Hadjar was seventh for Racing Bulls before beaching his car at Tamburello in a high-speed off with six minutes remaining in the session. The French rookie lost control of his car exiting the turn, where it spun off the road and slapped the far-side barrier sideways, the left side of the car taking the brunt of the damage.

Hadjar managed to keep the engine running and was able to power away from the scene of the crash and to the edge of the track, but after patiently waiting for a gap in traffic, he found his rear wheels were bogged in the gravel, leaving him stranded and forcing race control to suspend the session for four minutes to rescue the car.

Yuki Tsunoda was eighth in the second Red Bull Racing cars ahead of Williams teammates Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz.

Much like his teammate, Lewis Hamilton complained about brake problems aboard his Ferrari on his way to 11th and 0.65s off the pace.

Oliver Bearman was quicker than Franco Colapinto, Fernando Alonso, Liam Lawson and Gabriel Bortoleto.

Lance Stroll was 17th ahead of Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who was out of position after sending his Mercedes across the grass at Variante Alta on what should have been his fastest lap.

Nico Hulkenberg was 19th ahead of last-place Esteban Ocon at the foot of the timesheet.