Spanish Grand Prix: Friday Practice Recap

Event: Free Practice 1 & 2 for the Spanish Grand Prix – Friday August 14
Location: Circuit de Barcelona – Catalunya, Spain
Layout: 4.655-kilometer (2.892-mile), 16-turn circuit
FP1 & FP2 Weather: Mostly Sunny (FP1 & FP2) 
Drivers: Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen 

Free Practice No. 1 Rundown

Grosjean: 6th overall (1:18.291) 29 laps completed
Magnussen: 9th overall (1:18.620), 28 laps completed
Fastest Driver: Valtteri Bottas of Mercedes (1:16.785)
Most Laps: Bottas (Mercedes), Sainz (McLaren) – (33 laps)

Free Practice No. 2 Rundown

Grosjean: 5th overall (1:18.133), 29 laps completed
Magnussen: 16th overall (1:18.761), 36 laps completed
Fastest Driver: Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes (1:16.883)
Most Laps: Kimi Raikkonen of Alfa Romeo (42 laps)

Recap

The sixth round of the 2020 FIA Formula One World Championship began with practice Friday at Circuit de Barcelona – Catalunya as teams prepared for Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix.

Two 90-minute sessions – FP1 and FP2 – were run in mostly sunny conditions on the 4.655-kilometer (2.892-mile), 16-turn circuit with air temperature hitting 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) and track temperature peaking at 49 degrees Celsius (120.2 degrees Fahrenheit).

Grosjean kicked off his FP1 program on the Pirelli P Zero Yellow medium tire while Magnussen utilized the White hard compound to start. Both drivers transitioned onto the Red soft rubber for their fastest laps of the opening session. Grosjean banked a 1:18.291 to place sixth at the checkered. Magnussen joined his teammate in the top 10 courtesy of a 1:18.620 lap – good for ninth overall. 

Grosjean commenced FP2 with a nine-lap sampling of the hard rubber – with Magnussen opting for mediums for a seven-lap stint. They both bolted on fresh sets of soft tires for their qualifying simulations. Grosjean improved upon his morning lap time clocking a 1:18.133 – earning the Frenchman fifth spot on the timesheet. A 1:18.761 proved to be Magnussen’s quickest time of the session placing the Dane 16th at the checkered. The run plan concluded with high-fuel, long-distance runs.

Haas F1 Team ran a total of 122 laps on Friday across the two practice sessions – 64 by Magnussen and 58 by Grosjean.

 

Romain Grosjean, Driver No. 8, Haas F1 Team

“I don’t really know where this performance came from. In all fairness, it’s the same car from the beginning of the year, we’ve just been making some good set-up work since Silverstone. The performance there was really good, but it was power sensitive, here that’s maybe a little less. Sixth in FP1, fifth in FP2, then the long-run pace was pretty good too – we’re really happy with all that. There’s a little bit more work to be done on the car to bring it more to my liking. I hope nothing changes though, I hope this all stays the same so tomorrow we can go for a really good qualifying session – that would definitely set up a good weekend.”

Kevin Magnussen, Driver No. 20, Haas F1 Team

“It’s been a positive day. I didn’t get a great run on low fuel in FP2, so my best lap time doesn’t look good, but Romain (Grosjean) showed what’s in the car. Running on high fuel, it was all very positive. The car seems to be working very well around here. It’s been very hot, there’s a lot of heat in the tires, but it seems to be working. I think this track obviously suits us a little better. I’m pretty positive and very happy with today. It’ll be harder tomorrow, but hopefully we can get a little further up in qualifying than we have done so far this year, from there we can have a good race.”

Guenther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1 Team

“For sure, these have been our best Friday sessions this year. This kind of circuit, where there’s less high-speed sectors, it helps us as it’s a lot less power sensitive. We’ve always been relatively good here in Barcelona, I don’t know the reason why. I was cautiously optimistic in testing at the beginning of the year, and this shows that I wasn’t wrong. So, it looks encouraging but I’m not getting over-enthusiastic about it yet because we still have to qualify on Saturday and race on Sunday. There are still a lot of things we need to get right – which we could get wrong, so I don’t want to be negative. But overall, I think this is a big boost for the team. It’s great that we’ve been this competitive today, it’s an uplift for everybody. Now we have to put in the hard work so we don’t make any mistakes over the next two days. Hopefully we’ll bring home a good result.”