Lewis Hamilton went quickest as Mercedes completed a practice double on Friday at the Portuguese Grand Prix.
After the soft tyre issues in the morning, the afternoon went much more smoothly as the championship leader posted a 1m19.837s on his first flying lap, just under 0.15s faster than Max Verstappen in second.
Practice 1 pacesetter Valtteri Bottas slipped to third in the second Mercedes, while a poor soft tyre run saw his Red Bull counterpart Sergio Perez only 10th.
The Finn though might be under pressure from the leading midfield runners as Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari and both Alpine’s were within a tenth in P4 to P6.
Fernando Alonso just having the edge over teammate Esteban Ocon with 0.015s between them.
Charles Leclerc was seventh, and Daniel Ricciardo enjoyed perhaps his strongest day for McLaren in eighth, three-tenths clear of teammate Lando Norris.
Lance Stroll continued to lead Aston Martin’s charge in ninth, as the aforementioned Perez rounded out a top 10 covered by just 0.679s.
The tightly packed midfield meant AlphaTauri slipped down slightly with Pierre Gasly 11th and Yuki Tsunoda 14th.
While George Russell continued to feature higher up the order than usual in 13th for Williams.
Sebastian Vettel was 15th ahead of the two Alfa Romeo’s as just 0.013s split Kimi Raikkonen from teammate Antonio Giovinazzi in the Italian’s first session of the weekend.
Mick Schumacher once again outpaced Nicholas Latifi in 18th, with the Canadian going off into the gravel at Turn 8 at one point, and Nikita Mazepin sat eight-tenths off the rest of the field in 20th.
Back at the front, it appears to be advantage Mercedes after Friday at Portimao, though Verstappen certainly remains an ever-present threat.
Will that change on Saturday? We’ll have to wait and see!
Full results from Practice 2 can be seen below:
