Title-chasing Lando Norris topped the times ahead of Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg and his McLaren team-mate and series leader Oscar Piastri in the opening practice at the United States Grand Prix.
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The 25-year-old Briton, bristling after being disciplined internally by McLaren, clocked a best lap in one minute and 33.294 seconds to outpace Hulkenberg by 0.255sec and Piastri by 0.279sec as he bids to close a 22-point gap in the drivers’ title race with six events remaining.
Two-time champion Fernando Alonso was fourth for Aston Martin ahead of four-time champion Max Verstappen of Red Bull, Alex Albon of Williams and Mercedes’ George Russell.
Seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton was eighth for Ferrari.
All of the leading drivers clocked their best laps on soft slick tyres in the closing minutes except for Alonso, on hards, and Russell, Hamilton and rookie Isack Hadjar, who all used mediums.
The action began with Verstappen leading the way on a hot and sunny day at the sweeping Circuit of the Americas with an air temperature of 33C, enough for the ‘heat hazard’ rule to be executed, enabling drivers to wear cooling vests in their cars.
Not everyone chose to take a vest, the Dutchman going without because he found it to be uncomfortable and flawed.
As a result, his Red Bull car carried 500 grams of ballast to ensure he had no competitive weight advantage.
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Verstappen was quick to clock an early lap in 1:38.797, which he soon trimmed down to 1:35.426 after Carlos Sainz, Hamilton and Norris had taken the initiative.
Much of the early interest was focussed on the revised special liveries being run by six teams.
All of the teams were running on hard tyres — leaving their softs in preparation for sprint qualifying later on Saturday — with Hamilton, in particular, enjoying himself in what seemed to be a revitalised Ferrari.
The Briton went top again after 20 minutes in 1:34.857, half a second clear of Verstappen with Russell third.
A mid-session red flag paused the action for five minutes after debris from Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin landed on track at the final corner.
On resumption, Sainz was held back for gearbox repairs while Norris improved to take second behind Hamilton, half a second adrift.
With 15 minutes remaining, most drivers pitted for soft or medium tyres. Verstappen, on softs, clocked 1:33.648 to go top before being beaten by Alonso in 1:33.639, an advantage of 0.009.
Hamilton, on mediums, went fourth in a flurry of late activity that saw Norris romp to top spot in 1:33.294 on softs.
For Norris, this was an important session at a critical weekend as he sought to keep his title challenge on track following internal talks at McLaren over his collision with Piastri on the opening lap in Singapore.
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“The team held me accountable for what happened, which I think is fair,” Norris said.
“It has been dealt with,” said Piastri, without adding details on the latest ‘papaya rules’ (do what is best for the team) incident.
McLaren boss Zak Brown, meanwhile, called it “a little bit of a sporting repercussion” for Norris in an interview with Sky Sports.
“It’s very marginal. It probably won’t be noticed. Lando and Oscar know what it is, which is what’s most important,” Brown said.
“Of course we want to be transparent with our fans. We are doing it the hard way, trying to let both guys race for the championship – the easy way out would be to have a one and two, as some teams do, but that’s now how McLaren want to go racing.”
While the exact nature of the repercussion is unknown, 2009 Formula 1 champion Jenson Button suggested it may be something like allowing Piastri to choose when the first pitstop is.
“Normally it’s a telling-off after and you move on to the next race, it’s not like they are fighting for 10th and 11th, they are fighting for the world championship,” Button added.
“This might be the only opportunity these two drivers get to win a world championship or fight for one. They need to be given every opportunity possible.”
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But former F1 driver and Sky Sports analyst Martin Brundle warned the current set-up is “doomed to fail” regardless of what repercussions there are.
“100 per cent of course [the gloves are off],” he said.
“There is a championship to be won. They have got a fantastic car at McLaren, Max [Verstappen] is appearing in the rear-view mirrors quite quickly as well,” Brundle explained in Austin.
“In many respects this set-up is doomed to fail. You have got two supremely competitive athletes working in a team environment. It’s always going to go wrong, it’s just a question of how the teams handle it.”
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