Russian Grand Prix FP2 Results

Russian Grand Prix FP2 was another Bottas topped event concluding Friday’s events with a more familiar Mercedes 1-2 with Ricciardo consistently quick finishing P3.

Bottas clears 6x champion and fellow arrow Lewis Hamilton by a couple hundredths as The Briton recovered from his abysmal FP1 session earlier today. Hamilton is in hot pursuit of a record total win count of 91 still wasn’t quite on form just yet as he committed a couple mistakes on his flying run. He’ll need to continue this trajectory up if he wants a shot at Schumacher’s record given Valtteri’s form in Sochi over recent years. If you consider the team orders enforced in 2018 with Valtteri giving the spot to Lewis to help secure the title, Bottas had had the upper hand in Sochi. The Finn has delivered the following results since joining Mercedes:

Ricciardo’s impressive P3 was just a tenth and change better than Carlos Sainz who seeks to continue his form after his second podium of his career. The midfield battle will surely be a special one in Russia with Sainz ever increasing his confidence despite his FP1 shunt. 

Both Red Bull’s found themselves spun around later on in the track run around turn 14 for both. The RB car which normally handles kerbs extremely well appears to be twitchy in Russia – something Verstappen was very vocally displeased about. Speaking of uncomfortable, Ocon looks lightyears off his Aussie teammate who finished the session in P9. He’d end up splitting the Ferrari pair who look to be benefitting from their improved rear wing aero updates. A happy surprise from the Maranello outfit given their 2020 Season is on pace to be a top 5 worst showing in the illustrious history of the team.

Russian Grand Prix Outlook

The interesting development that is playing out is how real is the improvement the Scuderia are showing? Can they continue this pace? The car isn’t quite so bad on trim once it gets going – atleast in the hands of Leclerc. But if they’ve managed to find some marginal improvements, it’ll have a major benefit in a race I anticipate to be full of DNFs on the mechanical and a surprising amount of shunts from driver error as well as some touching early on. Verstappen and the Red Bull team are also a wild card. Given Honda has confirmed they’ve made “improvements” on the electrical side of the power unit, we shall see what comes of it given Verstappen losing power in Mugello. Down the field, the Williams battle seems to be heating up as Latifi takes a much needed advantage over Russell but more trouble for Haas as both Magnussen and Grosjean seem out of the race already before it even begins as they find themselves 2.210 and 3.339 seconds off the pace respectively. Keep up to date on The Russian Grand Prix at the Cranky Yankee Motorsport News Hub for all your Formula 1 coverage.