2016 F1 Round 5 Spanish Grand Prix FP1 – Vettel heads Ferrari one-two

The Spanish Grand Prix weekend opened with first practice at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on May 13. Vettel led with a 1:23.951, 0.138 seconds ahead of team-mate Räikkönen, as Ferrari finished one-two.

Archive photo of a monitor photographed during FP2 at the 2016 Brazilian Grand Prix, showing television coverage of Alonso.

Mercedes used only Pirelli medium tyres in this session. Rosberg and Hamilton finished third and fourth, 0.503 and 0.660 seconds behind Vettel respectively, while Ferrari set its leading times on a softer compound.

Verstappen finished sixth in his first practice session since moving up to Red Bull, one place behind new team-mate Ricciardo. Kvyat was twelfth on his return to Toro Rosso, four places and about half a second behind Sainz, who had remained with the team.

Renault put Ocon in Palmer’s car for FP1. Ocon completed only six untimed laps before technical problems stopped his running, so the official classification recorded six laps with no fastest-lap time.

Pérez also suffered a mechanical problem. Force India repaired his car and sent him back out before the end of the session. He completed nine laps and finished fourteenth, with team-mate Hülkenberg thirteenth.

McLaren brought a heavily upgraded MP4-31, and Alonso put the car in the top ten with tenth place. Button was nineteenth, about 1.4 seconds behind his team-mate, and complained about the car’s handling during the session.

Grosjean said the Haas felt “like a disaster” in slow corners. Both he and Gutiérrez set their first timed laps only after the first half of practice, eventually finishing sixteenth and seventeenth respectively.

There were several off-track moments during the session. Hamilton went off at Turn 1 twice, while Räikkönen also had one excursion. Massa spun at Turn 5, and all three drivers continued to complete practice.