05/07/2024
NEWS STORY
Round 12 of the 2024 FIA Formula 1 World Championship began with Friday practice at Silverstone International Circuit as teams prepared for Sunday's 52-lap British Grand Prix.
FP1 saw Oliver Bearman, a member of the Scuderia Ferrari Driver Academy, completing his third of six planned practice sessions in 2024 - the 19-year-old Brit confirmed on Thursday at Silverstone as a MoneyGram Haas F1 Team driver for the 2025 season. Bearman ran the upgraded package on the VF-24 with Hulkenberg on the previous spec for comparison during the 60-minute session.
Bearman set a fastest lap time of 1:28.536 (P14) on the Pirelli P Zero Red soft tire having started his program on the White hard compound. A high-fuel run on the used hards completed Bearman's F1 outing in front of his home crowd at the Northamptonshire circuit. Hulkenberg ran a baseline stint on the Yellow medium tires to start his Friday before a run on the softs netted him a best lap of 1:28.082 (P11). The German wrapped up FP1 with a high-fuel series on the medium compound.
Both VF-24s were kitted out with the upgrade package for FP2 in late afternoon - Kevin Magnussen returning alongside Hulkenberg in the garage. Magnussen was limited to a fastest lap of 1:28.122 (P20) on the soft tires with light rain hampering the Dane's timed attack. Hulkenberg managed a hot lap while track conditions remained dry, and he duly banged in a 1:26.990 to go fourth quickest on the timesheet. With heavy rain in the final minutes of FP2, both cars took their practice starts on the Pirelli Cinturato Green intermediate tires.
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team ran a total of 93 laps on Friday across FP1 and FP2 - Magnussen (20), Bearman (25), Hulkenberg (48).
Oliver Bearman: "It was a good session back in the car, especially at my home race, plus it's one of my favorite tracks. There are lots of positives to take from today and we got the new package on our car so we got to check it out and get a first read on it for the guys. I'm glad the session went well, and I wish the team the best of luck for this weekend."
Nico Hulkenberg: "It was a good Friday. In the morning we ran the previous spec car and during the break, the team put the update on ahead of FP2. There are certainly some differences, it felt positive from the get-go, but there's obviously still more to look at and optimize around it, but the first impression is positive and that's important and valuable. It may well be a challenging weekend with the weather, rain will probably happen and we need to be prepared for it. I like this track in the dry a lot, it's fascinating the speeds we run around here, but I'll take it as it comes."
Kevin Magnussen: "I sat out FP1 so I was just getting into the rhythm, and with the weather at the end I didn't manage to get a long run so not too many laps at all today, but hopefully we can get some more tomorrow. I got to try the car in the wet when we were going around the track to do the start. There wasn't too much gain from this session, but there's another tomorrow. I wouldn't mind rain, although Nico looked pretty quick in the dry as well, so we'll take it as it comes."
Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal: "Ollie was back in the car again for FP1 and he did a very good job as he has done before. It's really good to have Ollie confirmed and give him the chance to drive in front of his home crowd, that was amazing. Nico drove the previous package in FP1 and we gave him the update for FP2, and he felt the difference immediately. There are certain things that we still need to work on but for a baseline run, we were happy with what we saw. On Kevin's side, the story isn't the same as he felt a difference in car behavior this weekend compared to Spielberg, but he wasn't happy with the car. We've got lots of work to do to find out why Kevin isn't happy while Nico is. Overall, it's been a largely successful day; we got the data and we've now got driver feedback, but the unsuccessful part is that Kevin isn't happy with the car and that's something we will work on tonight."
Check out our Friday gallery from Silverstone here.