Friday Report: 2023 Italian GP
A mixed day for the team in Monza, with a solid FP1 session followed by a more challenging FP2, with performance still to be found on all tyre compounds.
On this Alternative Tyre Allocation weekend, both drivers ran a single set of Hard tyres in FP1, completing a programme of set-up evaluation and development experiments.
For FP2, George completed the planned programme of Medium and Soft tyres, combining single timed laps on both tyres and long running on the Medium
Lewis ran a higher downforce level in FP2, which cost straight line speed and did not deliver the expected gains in the corners. With time not available to revert in-session, he elected to save the Soft tyre for tomorrow and only ran the Medium.
Overall, the day left the team with plenty of opportunities for overnight gains, with Mick Schumacher running in the simulator in Brackley this evening to evaluate improvements.
FP1
George Russell | 28 Laps | 1:23.189 | P5 | Hard |
Lewis Hamilton | 26 Laps | 1:23.269 | P8 | Hard |
FP2
George Russell | 20 Laps | 1:22.176 | P9 | Medium, Soft |
Lewis Hamilton | 23 Laps | 1:22.783 | P17 | Medium |
George Russell
It’s great to be back in Monza and driving the car at these high speeds and with low downforce levels. The characteristics are very different to what we had last week in Zandvoort, and that’s something that it’s fun to adapt to. The car was feeling reasonably good, but we have some improvements to make on the soft tyre. The high fuel pace was looking pretty strong, so the focus tomorrow will be on finding more speed for qualifying.
Lewis Hamilton
It was a relatively normal Friday programme for me. The reliability was strong, and we got through the work that we needed to, checking off the different tests we had to do. There’s lots of learning from today, and we will have a bit of work tonight to try and improve for Saturday – as we always manage to do. I know that the team will do great work overnight to improve the set-up and car balance, so that we can be quicker tomorrow.
Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director
It’s been a messy day, partly with red flags but also because we’ve not got the car in a good place at the moment. That means we have a bit of work to do overnight to get the setup in the right place for the rest of the weekend. Single lap and long run both need work if we want to be competitive. There’s not much else to say; we just need to get on with the job of sorting the car out.