Marcos Siebert has grabbed the bragging rights by topping the timesheets in this afternoon’s busy free practice at the Red Bull Ring in Spielberg, Austria, claiming the top spot late in a hot and sunny session with a laptime of 1:19.703 to lead the way just ahead of Santino Ferrucci and Nirei Fukuzumi.
The session opened under ominously cloudy skies, with all of the field rushing to get out on track when the green lights came on, but it quickly dispersed as the drivers warmed their tyres leaving hot and sunny conditions for almost all of the session. Ferrucci set the first competitive lap before running well wide at the final corner, launching over the kerbs and just staying out of the barriers as Fukuzumi crossed the line to take the top spot from the American, with Giuliano Alesi in P2.
The Frenchman soon went one better to hold the top spot for the first set of tyres, with the field circulating on long run pace until just before the half hour mark when Anthoine Hubert ground to a halt just past turn 3, prompting a brief VSC period to remove his stricken car and for all of his rivals to return to the pits for fresh rubber.
On the second set of tyres Dorian Boccolacci set the early pace before the floodgates opened late in the session: Fukuzumi, Leonardo Pulcini and Alesi all swapped best times before Siebert claimed the honours with 5 minutes remaining, with Ferrucci and Fukuzumi beating their best times but just missing out on the top spot as the chequered flag emerged.
Behind the top three Alesi, Pulcini, Jack Aitken, George Russell, Raoul Hyman, Alessio Lorandi and Jenzer teammate Arjun Maini rounded out the top ten in a session which say 12 drivers within 0.5s of the fastest lap: it bodes well for yet another competitive qualifying session tomorrow morning.