Piastri puts McLaren on top in second Japanese GP practice session

Oscar Piastri continued McLaren's competitive start to the Japanese Grand Prix weekend with the fastest time of the second practice session ahead of the two Mercedes.

FP1 had the two McLarens within 0.2s of Mercedes, and Piastri duly went quickest on the qualifying simulations on Friday afternoon. Piastri’s time of 1m30.113s left him just under 0.1s clear of Chinese Grand Prix winner Kimi Antonelli, with George Russell 0.2s off in third place.

There was a sense of deja vu for Lando Norris as he was unable to emerge from the garage at the start of the session, following on from McLaren’s double-DNS at the previous race in Shanghai. The defending champion missed the first 20 minutes and then had another short delay before joining the action, going fourth quickest with an out-of-sync qualifying run, half a second adrift of Piastri.

That familiar feeling was also apparent at Audi, where Gabriel Bortoleto – another non-starter in China – failed to take part in any meaningful running during the session until the final 10 minutes. Both Bortoleto and Arvid Lindblad did hit the track to start FP2 but then had to return to their respective garages to address issues before setting a time, and while Audi did manage to get Bortoleto out, Lindblad was unable to rejoin the session.

Although Bortoleto was limited in his running, it was an encouraging session on the other side of the garage for Nico Hulkenberg, who was seventh fastest behind the two Ferrari drivers.

Charles Leclerc was fifth and Lewis Hamilton sixth, 0.7s and 0.8s off the fastest time respectively, with the Ferrari showing itself to be strong in the Esses and Degner curves but lacking elsewhere. Hamilton reported at the end of the session that he was driving slowly because he is lacking confidence in the car, suggesting Ferrari has plenty to work on overnight.

Alex Albon and Ollie Bearman were just ahead of Max Verstappen to round out the top 10, Red Bull again struggling to get the car handling to the Dutchman's liking. Verstappen was complaining of excessive understeer, and abandoned his qualifying simulation earlier than others in order to make further changes. 

The back of the field once again featured Aston Martin and Cadillac, with Valtteri Bottas leading the quartet just under 2.5s off the fastest time. He was a second ahead of Fernando Alonso, who jumped in for the first time after a late arrival in Japan due to the birth of his first child. Alonso took over from Jak Crawford, who had substituted for the Spaniard during FP1.

Although Bottas’ pace was solid, Cadillac’s afternoon was disrupted by an incident earlier in the day, with Sergio Perez missing the first half of FP2 while the team replaced his floor. The change was required due to damage sustained in contact with Albon in FP1, when the Williams driver ran into the side of Perez at the chicane.

The stewards investigated the collision between sessions and opted to take no further action, which both drivers agreed was the result of a misunderstanding. Perez had spotted Albon a number of corners earlier but didn’t expect the Williams – on an out lap – to close so quickly and continued with his race simulation, while Albon had mistaken a wide line taken by Perez as an invitation to pass.

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