Bottas leads Mercedes 1-2 in opening Spanish GP practice

It was the usual Mercedes 1-2 in opening practice for the Spanish GP at Barcelona Friday morning. Valtteri Bottas was quickest with a time of 1m16.785s, just 0.039s faster than his teammate Lewis Hamilton.

Last week’s winner Max Verstappen was 3rrd quick in his Red Bull Honda nearly 1-second behind.

The two Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel set nearly identical times to round out the top-5.

Was that plain sailing for Mercedes? Not quite. Both drivers again looked to be struggling with tire wear, with obvious lines of blisters appearing when they pushed the soft compound tire.

Red Bull might not be too happy with the time gap to Mercedes, but they could well have been running more fuel than their rivals.

Practice 1 Results

POS	NO	DRIVER	CAR	TIME	GAP	LAPS
1	77	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	1:16.785	+0.000s	33
2	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:16.824	+0.039s	29
3	33	Max Verstappen	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:17.724	+0.939s	26
4	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	1:17.970	+1.185s	27
5	5	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:17.981	+1.196s	27
6	8	Romain Grosjean	Haas Ferrari	1:18.291	+1.506s	29
7	11	Sergio Perez	Racing Point BWT Mercedes	1:18.471	+1.686s	31
8	23	Alexander Albon	Red Bull Racing Honda	1:18.606	+1.821s	27
9	20	Kevin Magnussen	Haas Ferrari	1:18.620	+1.835s	28
10	18	Lance Stroll	Racing Point BWT Mercedes	1:18.643	+1.858s	31
11	55	Carlos Sainz	McLaren Renault	1:18.733	+1.948s	33
12	31	Esteban Ocon	Renault	1:18.736	+1.951s	31
13	4	Lando Norris	McLaren Renault	1:18.744	+1.959s	32
14	10	Pierre Gasly	AlphaTauri Honda	1:18.888	+2.103s	26
15	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	Alfa Romeo Racing Ferrari	1:18.917	+2.132s	24
16	7	Kimi Räikkönen	Alfa Romeo Racing Ferrari	1:18.981	+2.196s	24
17	26	Daniil Kvyat	AlphaTauri Honda	1:19.145	+2.360s	21
18	3	Daniel Ricciardo	Renault	1:19.230	+2.445s	31
19	6	Nicholas Latifi	Williams Mercedes	1:20.334	+3.549s	30
20	40	Roy Nissany	Williams Mercedes	No Time	–	–