• Bottas' fast Friday

Valtteri Bottas has returned to the front of the field after not being in the fight between his teammate and Max Verstappen this season. Not only that but being behind Lando Norris in the championship a surge of pace was certainly needed.

Behind by 0.027 seconds was Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton ahead of championship leader Verstappen in third. Verstappen struggled when on softs complaining of huge understeer throughout the whole session.

In fourth was Esteban Ocon who put in a great lap as Alpine put together the start of what could be a very promising weekend. Sergio Perez found himself in P5 being eight tenths behind table-topping Bottas with some speed to find to support his teammate.

Embed from Getty Images

  • Midfield unpredictability continues

In P6 was Pierre Gasly who had to put in all of the laps for Alpha Tauri as Yuki Tsunoda's car was in the garage for the majority of the session. Fernando Alonso was close behind to continue Alpine's great start to the weekend.

Sebastian Vettel in P8 was closely followed by Norris, Lance Stroll, and Charles Leclerc who were all separated by less than a tenth of a second from P9 to P11.

Carlos Sainz and Daniel Ricciardo will think that they had a very frustrating session in P12 and P13 leaving themselves at the back end of the midfield when they are expected to be at the forefront of the midfield.

Embed from Getty Images

  • Tsunoda mistake costly

With only three laps completed in FP2, Tsunoda found himself misplaced in the backfield of which Kimi Raikkonen found himself at the front. George Russell was close behind ahead of his typically fast Saturdays awaiting him.

Nicholas Latifi was left in P16 ahead of the recovering Tsunoda who is ahead of Mick Schumacher who put in a great session not only finishing ahead of his teammate Nikita Mazepin but also the Alfa Romeo of Antonio Giovinazzi solidifying a great P18 for the young German.

The Friday had thrown up many curveballs that will produce interesting scenarios come Saturday with the rain expected over the coming couple of days. The title battle continues with a new exciting chapter.