Azerbaijan Grand Prix: Russell Tops Practice Sessions As Antonelli Overcomes Hydraulic Failure

George Russell led both practice sessions for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, putting Mercedes at the top of the timesheets while teammate Kimi Antonelli battled reliability problems.

Russell led Antonelli by 0.552 seconds in the second session. In the first session, Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was Russell’s closest rival, while Antonelli suffered a hydraulic failure.

Antonelli’s issue also forced Mercedes to change his engine. The team spent the first half-hour of the second session completing repairs, leaving the Italian to miss the first half of FP2 and complete only half the running of Russell. He went straight into performance runs on soft tyres after missing set-up and development time at the end of the first hour and the start of the second.

Racing Bulls’ Arvid Lindblad had his second crash in consecutive race weekends in practice, clipping the wall on the exit of the tight chicane leading into the castle section. Debris and sparks flew from the impact.

Verstappen was 0.4 seconds slower than Russell in FP1 and 0.827 seconds adrift in FP2, finishing third behind the two Mercedes. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton were next but more than a second off the pace. Lando Norris was sixth, 1.484 seconds back, in a McLaren featuring a heavy aerodynamic upgrade. Alpine’s Pierre Gasly was seventh, ahead of the second McLaren of Oscar Piastri and Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar, who returned after missing three races with a broken wrist.

Antonelli leads Russell by 81 points in the championship ahead of this weekend. The margin between the Mercedes drivers was expected given the disrupted day, but Antonelli is likely to close the gap in the run-up to qualifying.