Valtteri Bottas finds himself on provisional pole for the Japanese Grand Prix after leading second practice at Suzuka.
Before the session, it was announced that if qualifying, which has already been postponed until Sunday morning, couldn’t take place, lap times from second practice would be used to form the grid.
That meant teams had to open the taps and little earlier than usual just in case.
Initially, it was Sebastian Vettel leading Max Verstappen by 0.065s as the qualifying simulations began, there was slight drama when Bottas spun exiting the final chicane trying to start a flying lap, also forcing Lewis Hamilton to complete an extra warm-up lap.
The Briton was still able to take P1 by almost half a second on the fastest compound, with his teammate slotting into second just ahead of Vettel.
Leclerc and Verstappen followed within a tenth of the German and Albon also impressed, less than 0.2s behind the Dutchman in sixth.
Heading out for a second run on fresh tyres, Max jumped upto second briefly before Mercedes responded with Bottas taking P1 with a 1m27.785s, a tenth ahead of Hamilton.
Ferrari opted not to run again, instead, switching to the usual race simulations, allowing Albon to move upto fifth.
In the final minutes though, Vettel and Leclerc did emerge on the soft compound tyres only for traffic to limit their progress as the Monegasque took fourth with Sebastian in fifth.
The battle for ‘best of the rest’ was ultra-competitive with several teams holding the seventh place.
In the end, just like the morning, it was McLaren and Racing Point leading the way with Carlos Sainz ahead of Sergio Perez.
Pierre Gasly completed a late flier to take ninth for Toro Rosso, dropping Lando Norris back to P10 for the second straight session.
The midfield remains incredibly close, however, with the gap from P7 to P17, which was 1.3s in the morning, reduced to just 0.8s in the afternoon.
Indeed, only 0.3s covered Perez and teammate Lance Stroll, but five cars would fit between them as the Canadian slipped to 14th.
Antonio Giovinazzi, who lost a good portion of the morning session due to a hydraulics problem, returned to the track in 15th for Alfa Romeo.
But the team most disappointed with their session will be Renault as Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg sat 17th and 18th.
Ricciardo would have an attempted soft tyre run hampered by a slow-moving Kevin Magnussen at the final chicane, but still, the lack of pace will be a concern for the French manufacturer.
In fact, only the two Williams’ would be behind in the final standings as Robert Kubica led George Russell by a tenth of a second.
A slightly unique practice session with teams trying to factor in the possibility of the results counting towards the grid but there were few surprises with perhaps only Verstappen’s P3 and Renault’s slow performance the only unexpected twist.
Full results from Practice 2 at Suzuka can be seen below:
