Formula 1: Red Bull's Max Verstappen sets pace in Canadian Grand Prix practice

Montreal [Canada], June 18 (ANI): Reigning world champion Max Verstappen set the pace in Friday practice sessions for the Canadian Grand Prix 2022, but his title rival Charles Leclerc kept him on edge at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

In FP2, the Red Bull driver clocked a 1m 14.127s on fresh soft tyres, with a chunk of fuel taken out, to top the times ahead of Leclerc, with the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz two-tenths of a second off the pace in third.

Perhaps the surprise of the session came from Sebastian Vettel, winner in Canada in 2018, with the German putting his Aston Martin a superb fourth, only 0.315s off the ultimate pace.

Fernando Alonso looked strong in first practice and he continued that form into the second session, slotting his Alpine into fifth - a tenth behind his fellow world champion Vettel - with AlphaTauri's Pierre Gasly sixth.

George Russell claimed seventh place for Mercedes ahead of the McLaren cars of Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo, and the final top 10 place was taken by Alpine's Esteban Ocon who beat Perez, Aston Martin's Lance Stroll, who also set to be investigated for the Turn 14 offence as his team-mate, and the second Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton.

Earlier, Max Verstappen went quickest in the opening practice session for the 2022 FIA Formula 1 Canadian Grand Prix as the sport returned to the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve for the first time since 2019. Verstappen outpaced Ferrari's Carlos Sainz by over two tenths of a second with Fernando Alonso third for Alpine.

Perez was left with fourth place, 0.4s behind his team-mate at the flag. Charles Leclerc in the other Ferrari settled for fifth place, 0.508 in arrears to Verstappen.

Sixth place on the timesheet went to George Russell who was separated from Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton by home favourite Lance Stroll who took his Aston Martin to seventh place, 0.664 off Verstappen's place. Behind Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel was ninth in the second Aston Martin and Daniel Ricciardo rounded out the top for McLaren. (ANI)

Source: Sports