Charles Leclerc led Carlos Sainz for a Ferrari 1-2 in first practice for the 2023 Singapore GP, ahead of Max Verstappen – who struggled with low-speed cornering in his RB19 – and a starring Lando Norris, who spent most of the session on top with his MCL60 heavily upgraded for this weekend.
Photo Credits: Scuderia Ferrari
The drivers took to a modified Marina Bay Street Circuit, with layout changes on the final sector due to construction work around the bay meaning the old turns 16-19 are removed, forming one long straight from turn 15 all the way to the old turn 20.
Taking place in day time, this is one of the most “irrelevant” sessions for the teams in terms of race and qualifying preparation – however, a raft of upgrades up and down the pit lane means the session will be an important test of new parts.
McLaren and AlphaTauri bring the most notable upgrades, with almost a complete overhaul of their respective cars – although the Woking squad only brought one set of those changes, and that will be in Lando Norris’ MCL60 only.
Most cars headed out on track on the hard compound tyres for the installation laps in the first 10 minutes of track running.
Max Verstappen calmly reported over the radio to be suffering with instability in his RB19 in low-speed corners.
The classified order after the initial 10 minutes featured Lando Norris’ heavily upgraded McLaren on top – although on medium tyres, with a time of a 1:35.782, just over three tenths ahead of Monza podium finisher Carlos Sainz and his team-mate Charles Leclerc, followed by Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen.
The Briton’s time would quickly be beaten by the two Ferrari cars, with Sainz heading to the top and then being pipped by Leclerc by just 0.035s, with a 1:35.683, with Norris then slotting just 0.009s behind after his latest lap, still on medium tyres.
The reigning world champion continued to report issues with low-speed cornerning to his Red Bull team as the session approached a quarter of its duration, with his best time on the hard tyres leaving him down in fifth place, just over two tenths back from new pace-setter Lewis Hamilton’s 1:35.571.
That time was soon beaten by Lando Norris with a significant margin, of nearly eight tenths, with a 1:34.776 getting the McLaren driver back on top of the pile, and over five-and-a-half tenths ahead of Sergio Perez’s latest effort on the hard tyres.
With 25 minutes of the session gone, most cars returned to the pits after their initial runs, and this was the classified order of the top 10: Norris, Russell, Leclerc, Ocon, Perez, Hamilton, Sainz, Verstappen, Tsunoda and Gasly.
Behind the top 10, Liam Lawson sat in 11th place, just over 1.5s off the ultimate pace set by Norris, ahead of Piastri, Stroll, Albon, Hulkenberg, Alonso, Sargeant, Bottas, Magnussen and the newly re-signed for 2024 Zhou Guanyu rounding out the field in last place, nearly 2.7s off the top spot.
Pierre Gasly was the first driver to get a run on the soft compound tyres, and immediately jumped up to second place, just 0.204s behind Norris’ earlier benchmark.
Oscar Piastrj was the next driver to fit the soft tyres, the Australian, missing most of the upgrades that are installed on Norris’ car, could only manage ninth place, over 0.9s back from Norris earlier medium tyres lap.
Kevin Magnussen then went fourth fastest in his Haas, sporting no upgrades this weekend, just under a quarter of a second back from Norris.
With 25 minutes of the session remaining, an unusual yellow flag came out in sector two, as a lizard got into the circuit – something that was already seen during practice sessions in Singapore on 2016, with Max Verstappen once again joking over the radio, referring to it as “smaller” this time around. The track was quickly cleared as the animal went out of harm’s way – but the wildlife residents would come back a further two times befor the session ended, but no damage done.
With his McLaren heavily covered in flo-vis paint, Lando Norris obliterated the best time of the session, going fastest with a 1:33.522 on the soft tyres, nearly four-and-a-half tenths clear of Sainz and over half-a-second clear of George Russell, all on the softs.
Charles Leclerc, a former pole-sitter around the circuit, then went fastest with a 1:33.350, with Max Verstappen slotting between him and the Briton, 0.126s off the top.
With just a quarter of the session remaining, the order of the top 10 was: Leclerc, Verstappen, Norris, Hamilton, Russell, Perez, Sainz, Tsunoda, Ocon and Gasly. Sainz then went second fastest with his latest lap on softs, just eight hundredths back from his team-mate.
Alonso went out for his soft tyre run with just 10 minutes remaining, but could only manage eighth place, over six tenths back from Leclerc.
The final classified order of the top 10 was: Leclerc, Sainz, Verstappen, Norris, Hamilton, Russell, Perez, Alonso, Tsunoda and Ocon.
With this being one of two the most unrepresentative sessions this weekend, focus now turns to free practice two, in the night time and conditions similar to those that we’ll see during competitive sessions.
Source: Formula 1
