Albon fastest despite crashing in wet practice session

Alexander Albon was quickest in a rain-hit first practice session at Interlagos – but finished his run in the wall.

The Red Bull driver skidded off at Juncao as he prepared to begin his first run on slick tyres in a session which began on a very wet circuit. The RB15 snapped sideways under braking on the way into the corner.

All four of the Red Bull-backed drivers risked runs on soft tyres in the final minutes of practice, but it paid off for none of them. Max Verstappen and Daniil Kvyat also spun at turn one, but without hitting anything. “For me it’s too wet and pointless,” reported Kvyat after his spin, at around the same time Albon was heading into the barrier.

Albon set the quickest practice lap earlier in the sessions on intermediate tyres. A 1’16.142 put him on top of the times by over half a second from Valtteri Bottas and the two Ferrari drivers. Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc had a busy start to the session when the track was at its wettest.

Carlos Sainz Jnr, who was the first driver to set a time on the soaked track, set the fifth-fastest time for McLaren. He was followed by the Renault and Toro Rosso drivers, followed by team mate Lando Norris.

Williams test driver Nicholas Latifi was last of the 16 drivers who set times. Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton were among those who did not set times, though the world champion ventured out of the pits on medium compound slick tyres at the end of the session.

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Pos.	No.	Driver	Car	Best lap	Gap	Laps
1	23	Alexander Albon	Red Bull-Honda	1’16.142		9
2	77	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	1’16.693	0.551	10
3	5	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1’17.041	0.899	13
4	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	1’17.285	1.143	13
5	55	Carlos Sainz Jnr	McLaren-Renault	1’17.786	1.644	16
6	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Renault	1’17.899	1.757	8
7	3	Daniel Ricciardo	Renault	1’17.985	1.843	9
8	10	Pierre Gasly	Toro Rosso-Honda	1’18.100	1.958	17
9	26	Daniil Kvyat	Toro Rosso-Honda	1’18.274	2.132	16
10	4	Lando Norris	McLaren-Renault	1’18.559	2.417	15
11	63	George Russell	Williams-Mercedes	1’18.779	2.637	18
12	20	Kevin Magnussen	Haas-Ferrari	1’19.247	3.105	10
13	18	Lance Stroll	Racing Point-Mercedes	1’19.414	3.272	6
14	7	Kimi Raikkonen	Alfa Romeo-Ferrari	1’19.532	3.390	12
15	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	Alfa Romeo-Ferrari	1’19.600	3.458	18
16	40	Nicholas Latifi	Williams-Mercedes	1’20.010	3.868	16
17	8	Romain Grosjean	Haas-Ferrari			3
18	11	Sergio Perez	Racing Point-Mercedes			1
19	33	Max Verstappen	Red Bull-Honda			3
20	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes			3

First practice visual gaps

Drivers more then ten seconds off the pace omitted.

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