Sainz led the opening practice session at Albert Park before Ferrari teammate Leclerc managed to go even faster in FP2 to end the day the quickest of all.
Red Bull emerged as Ferrari’s closest challenger in both practice sessions, with Max Verstappen leading the charge for the Austrian team.
Australian Grand Prix FP1 results: Sainz fastest from Leclerc
What happened in Australian GP Free Practice 1?
Verstappen set the bar at 1m21.625s, running the soft tires early, and lowered his time to 1m21.140s and 1m20.909s as the track began to rubber-in. A piece then fell off teammate Perez’s Red Bull, causing a brief red flag after 21 minutes.
Verstappen ran again on the softs, trimming his fastest time down to 1m20.857s. Leclerc then grabbed the top spot with 1m20.825s.
Verstappen retook P1 on 1m20.377s before Leclerc and Sainz grabbed a Ferrari 1-2, with Carlos on top with 1m20.325s, just 0.052s ahead of his teammate. Sainz then improved the P1 time to 1m19.806s, over half a second clear of the pack, but escaped a huge moment on the exit of Turn 2 in the closing minutes of the session.
Leclerc’s biggest moment came at Turn 1 when he visited the gravel after a practice launch from the pitlane and then another excursion at Turn 13 on his last lap.
Perez took third late on, helped a second off Sainz, with Verstappen fourth, another two tenths further back, ahead of Lando Norris (McLaren), Esteban Ocon (Alpine) and Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes).
Kevin Magnussen had a brief off at Turn 3 in his Haas but continued. Fernando Alonso suffered a quick spin, while Sebastian Vettel’s first day back at Aston Martin after his COVID diagnosis ended in a cloud of smoke that caused a second red flag.
His ride back to the pit lane on a scooter did not go down well with the FIA.
Australian Grand Prix FP2 results: Leclerc fastest from Verstappen
| Cla | # | drivers | chassis | engine | time | gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 16 | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari | Ferrari | 1’18,978 | |
| 2 | 1 | Max Verstappen | red bull | red bull | 1’19.223 | 0.245 |
| 3 | 55 | Carlos Sainz | Ferrari | Ferrari | 1’19,376 | 0.398 |
| 4 | 14 | Fernando Alonso | Alpine | Renault | 1’19,537 | 0.559 |
| 5 | 11 | Sergio Perez | red bull | red bull | 1’19,658 | 0.680 |
| 6 | 31 | Esteban Ocon | Alpine | Renault | 1’19,842 | 0.864 |
| 7 | 77 | Valtteri Bottas | Alfa Romeo | Ferrari | 1’20,055 | 1,077 |
| 8th | 4 | Lando Norris | McLaren | Mercedes | 1’20.100 | 1.122 |
| 9 | 10 | Pierre Gasly | AlphaTauri | red bull | 1’20.142 | 1.164 |
| 10 | 3 | Daniel Ricciardo | McLaren | Mercedes | 1’20.203 | 1,225 |
| 11 | 63 | George Russell | Mercedes | Mercedes | 1’20.212 | 1,234 |
| 12 | 22 | Yuki Tsunoda | AlphaTauri | red bull | 1’20,424 | 1,446 |
| 13 | 44 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | Mercedes | 1’20,521 | 1,543 |
| 14 | 18 | Lance Stroll | Aston-Martin | Mercedes | 1’20.611 | 1,633 |
| 15 | 24 | Zhou Guanyu | Alfa Romeo | Ferrari | 1’21,063 | 2,085 |
| 16 | 20 | Kevin Magussen | haas | Ferrari | 1’21.191 | 2.213 |
| 17 | 23 | Alexander Albon | Williams | Mercedes | 1’21,912 | 2,934 |
| 18 | 47 | Mike Schumacher | haas | Ferrari | 1’21,974 | 2,996 |
| 19 | 6 | Nicholas Latifi | Williams | Mercedes | 1’22.307 | 3,329 |
| 20 | 5 | Sebastian Vettel | Aston-Martin | Mercedes |
What happened in Australian GP Free Practice 2?
Sainz led a 1-2 for Ferrari in the first part of FP2, setting the early pace with a time of 1m19.979s.
Sainz and Leclerc began trading the top spot on the timesheets after switching to soft tires 20 minutes into the session, the Ferrari duo finding continuous improvements to stay clear of the chasing pack.
After the 40-minute mark, Leclerc gave a glimpse of the underlying pace of the F1-75, lapping the circuit in 1m18.978s to assert his authority at the top of the timesheets.
Verstappen managed to separate the two Ferraris on his next soft tire run, but still ended up nearly a quarter of a second behind Leclerc after losing a chunk of time in the final sector.
The session had to be red flagged with just over 10 minutes left on the clock after Lance Stroll lost some bodywork from his Aston Martin after running over a kerb, but the track was soon cleared to allow all drivers to complete one final run.
In the end, Leclerc’s previous time was not to be usurped, the Bahrain GP winner ending Friday practice comfortably on top ahead of reigning champion Verstappen and Ferrari teammate Sainz.
Alonso finished an impressive fourth in the Alpine, with Ocon backing up the performance of his teammate in sixth – behind the second Red Bull of Perez.
Mercedes failed to break inside the top 10, with Russell classified 11th and Hamilton finishing further behind in 13th.
Vettel spent the entire FP2 in the garage as Aston Martin crew worked on changing the Mercedes engine on the back of his car.
