Hungarian GP: Pirelli Friday Practice Review

Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo not only beat last year’s pole time by more than a second and half in FP2, but also came very close to breaking the all-time Hungaroring lap record from 2004, on the first day of running this year.

Ricciardo was fastest during both free practice sessions today, using the supersoft compound on each occasion, which is around 0.8 seconds faster than the soft. The other nominated tyre this weekend is the medium – mostly used for installation laps – with all three compounds run today as teams concentrated on assessing car balance on different fuel loads.

After a cloudy start, the weather warmed up during the day to more than 45 degrees of track temperature. Despite this, and the non-stop flow of corners at the Hungaroring, none of the tyres demonstrated any sign of blistering.

MARIO ISOLA - HEAD OF CAR RACING
“The new asphalt laid before the race last year showed itself to be smooth and offer good grip one year on; and its dark colour also means that it increases track temperature. Track temperature already started quite off warm in FP1 and then got around eight degrees hotter in FP2, with the supersoft tyre consistently quickest in both sessions. We were able to effectively assess the lap time differences between the soft and supersoft, which will be the main race tyres, but there’s still a question mark about degradation due to the long runs being interrupted by the two red flags in FP2. At the front in particular, the pace seems very closely matched.”

FREE PRACTICE 1 – TOP 3 TIMES
DRIVER 		TIME 	  COMPOUND 	
Ricciardo 	1m18.486s SUPERSOFT NEW
Raikkonen	1m18.720s SUPERSOFT USED
Hamilton 	1m18.858s SUPERSOFT NEW

FREE PRACTICE 2 – TOP 3 TIMES
DRIVER 		TIME 	  COMPOUND
Ricciardo 	1m18.455s SUPERSOFT NEW
Vettel		1m18.638s SUPERSOFT NEW
Bottas 		1m18.656s SUPERSOFT NEW

FP1 - BEST TIME BY COMPOUND
COMPOUND 	DRIVER 	   TIME
MEDIUM 		Verstappen 1m30.378s
SOFT		Ricciardo  1m19.920s
SUPERSOFT 	Ricciardo  1m18.486s

FP2 - BEST TIME BY COMPOUND
COMPOUND 	DRIVER 	   TIME
MEDIUM 		- 	   -
SOFT		Hamilton   1m18.779s
SUPERSOFT 	Ricciardo  1m18.455s

MOST LAPS BY COMPOUND SO FAR
COMPOUND 	DRIVER 	   	  LAPS
MEDIUM 		Kvyat, Verstappen 4
SOFT		Ocon		  22
SUPERSOFT 	Sainz 		  25

TYRE STATISTICS OF THE DAY
		    	MEDIUM	SOFT 	SUPER SOFT
Kms driven* 		109 	1322 	3154
Sets used overall**	14	26	53

* The above number gives the total amount of kilometres
driven in FP1 and FP2 today, all drivers combined.
** Per compound, all drivers combined.