Alonso leads second practice, Hamilton under investigation

Fernando Alonso was fastest of all in the second practice session for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

Following a 10-minute delay to the start of the session – reported to be due to a loose drain cover – a full hour of running took place uninterrupted, with Alonso going quickest with a 1’28.827 on the soft tyres.

George Russell was almost a quarter of a second slower than the Aston Martin driver in seconds, with Max Verstappen third, another tenth of a second behind.

Charles Leclerc was fourth fastest for Ferrari, with Sergio Perez fifth and Lance Stroll sixth in the second Aston Martin. Carlos Sainz Jnr was seventh ahead of Lewis Hamilton, Pierre Gasly and Oscar Piastri rounding out the top ten.

Hamilton will be investigated by the stewards following a potentially dangerous incident at turn 11. The Mercedes had backed off through the fast sequence of sweepers in the opening sector to allow Carlos Sainz Jnr through, but the Ferrari also slowed. Williams driver Logan Sargeant arrived behind the pair and had to run off-track to avoid hitting Hamilton, kicking up sparks as he hit a kerb at speed.

“What Hamilton did there is super-dangerous,” Sainz told his team over the radio. “He was in the middle, he could have got out of the way. Sargeant nearly crashed because of him.”

Lance Stroll was shown the black-and-white warning flag, as Pierre Gasly was in the earlier session, for failing to follow race director Niels Wittich’s orders to not touch the painted areas along the pit straight between the pit lane and the race track.

Valtteri Bottas was the only driver to suffer a significant off when he spun at turn one without hitting anything. Each driver covered between 22 and 29 laps, with Gasly and Daniel Ricciardo getting the most laps in and Hamilton the fewest after complaining of a loss of power in his car late in the session.

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2024 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix second practice result

P.	#	Driver	Team	Model	Time	Gap	Laps
1	14	Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin-Mercedes	AMR24	1’28.827		28
2	63	George Russell	Mercedes	W15	1’29.057	0.230	24
3	1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull-Honda RBPT	RB20	1’29.158	0.331	27
4	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	SF-24	1’29.180	0.353	25
5	11	Sergio Perez	Red Bull-Honda RBPT	RB20	1’29.300	0.473	27
6	18	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin-Mercedes	AMR24	1’29.336	0.509	27
7	55	Carlos Sainz Jnr	Ferrari	SF-24	1’29.455	0.628	26
8	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	W15	1’29.504	0.677	22
9	10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine-Renault	A524	1’29.528	0.701	29
10	81	Oscar Piastri	McLaren-Mercedes	MCL38	1’29.594	0.767	27
11	22	Yuki Tsunoda	RB-Honda RBPT	01	1’29.666	0.839	28
12	4	Lando Norris	McLaren-Mercedes	MCL38	1’29.758	0.931	23
13	24	Zhou Guanyu	Sauber-Ferrari	C44	1’29.777	0.950	27
14	23	Alexander Albon	Williams-Mercedes	FW46	1’29.789	0.962	28
15	31	Esteban Ocon	Alpine-Renault	A524	1’29.901	1.074	27
16	2	Logan Sargeant	Williams-Mercedes	FW46	1’29.934	1.107	27
17	20	Kevin Magnussen	Haas-Ferrari	VF-24	1’29.985	1.158	24
18	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas-Ferrari	VF-24	1’30.077	1.250	26
19	3	Daniel Ricciardo	RB-Honda RBPT	01	1’30.088	1.261	29
20	77	Valtteri Bottas	Sauber-Ferrari	C44	1’30.153	1.326	27

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2024 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix

• Vowles being patient with Sargeant but expects to see “progress”
• “So I’ve got nothing to worry about?” – The best unheard team radio from Jeddah
• “Shock” of poor start to season showed need for change at Alpine – Famin
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• Bearman calls Ferrari debut a “dream” but admits “I made a lot of mistakes”

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