Shades Of Orange Today At Spa

The first day of action at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit was dominated by various shades of orange. Max Verstappen was quickest in the first session in a time of 1’43”372, much to the delight of the orange army that packed the grandstands and viewing areas around the Ardennes circuit. However, in the second session, the three time world champion and his Red Bull had to give way to the papaya shade of orange. Max topped the time sheet in FP2 after his first run on Softs with a time of 1’42”477, but then had to give best to the McLarens of Oscar Piastri, by just two thousandths of a second and then, more emphatically outpaced by Lando Norris who posted a time of 1’42”260. Not only was the Englishman’s time much quicker than the 2022 pole position time of 1’43”655 set by Verstappen, it was also well under the predicted time of 1’42”800. The 2023 event was run to the Sprint format and both qualifying sessions were not comparable to today’s times as the track was wet.

Both sessions were run in reasonably constant climatic conditions, with cloudy skies and track temperatures going from a fraction over 37 °C in FP1 to a low of 30 °C in FP2. Twelve of the twenty drivers have already used one set of Hard tyres out of the two they can use per race weekend. Only the Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren and Alpine drivers have kept both sets.

In FP1 and FP2, a few cuts were seen in some tyres, caused by gravel brought onto the track by cars that went through the run-off areas and back onto the track.

Max Verstappen – Fastest in FP1

“We tried quite a few things today, tweaking and testing the car, because it is typically Spa where of course you have sector one and three where you want the top speed and then a very long middle sector where you want a cornering speed. It is always very tricky to find the right balance when you are trying a few things to see what is better. We’ll look at it on the data and analyse the day in debrief. We started off quite positively today and have some things to work on from FP2, so there are a few things to look at. Hopefully all the changes that we made will come together, especially as I will be starting near the back for the race because of the engine penalty. However, we will try to optimise this as much as we can. Naturally, you always want a good qualifying, but the race is our focus.”

Lando Norris – Fastest in FP2

“It’s been a reasonable day. The car seems quick, and we’ve gathered some good information. I’ve still got some work to do tomorrow on making sure I feel comfortable in the car, but I started to find more of a rhythm in the end. We’ll see what tomorrow holds.”

Simone Berra – Pirelli Chief Engineer

“It looks like being a particularly demanding weekend on the tyre front, as in fact was to be expected on a special track like Spa-Francorchamps. The fact that large sections of the track have been resurfaced has seen a significant increase in grip which, on the one hand, has made the track much quicker, already by almost 1”4 compared to the pole from two years ago, the last time there was a realistic reference point, while on the other hand it has probably led to an increase in graining, especially on the Medium and Soft and therefore a consequent increase in performance degradation over a long distance. In both sessions, we also saw a marked track evolution.

As the track is expected to be mainly wet tomorrow and then dry on Sunday, the teams will have to rely on the data gathered today to come up with the best set-up and strategies on a track where it is already more complicated than usual to find the right compromise between the need for aerodynamic downforce to stop the tyres from sliding, especially in the second sector, and maintaining good top speed to be competitive in the quicker first and third sectors. Compared to what we saw over the previous two years with this new generation of cars, the C2 seemed to be pretty competitive and could be a valid choice for the race, which explains why four teams have kept two sets for each of their drivers.”