Brendan Lines 26 Sept, 2020 06:00am

Mercedes’ Valterri Bottas topped the timing charts in Friday’s FP1 at the Sochi Autodrome ahead of a charging Daniel Ricciardo, surprisingly the sister Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton slipped back to P19 struggling for a timed lap.

Bottas revealed during the week he visited a church in search of devine intervention after his fortunes in Mugello, the Fin’s prayers may have been heard as Bottas was right on the pace while others struggled adapting to the evolving Sochi track — once known to have little to no tyre degradation.

“There’s definitely more to come but overall, it was a positive first day of running. Conditions were quite tricky out there and that’s why there were so many drivers making mistakes. There were a few interruptions and that meant we were a bit limited with running, and I also had a big lock-up, which destroyed a set of tyres,” he said.

In a rare hiccup to his so far dominant 2020 season, Lewis Hamilton chewed through his Soft and Hard tyres with early lock-ups compromising the Brit’s session, as Hamilton’s best time was +2.793s off Bottas’ pace.

Australia’s Daniel Ricciardo continued his consistent run of top three finishes in Friday practice with a personal best P2, the Aussie’s best time was +0.507s shy to the Fin, but just over a tenth and a half clear of his nearest rival Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.

Behind Verstappen, the Racing Point cars ran line a stern with Sergio Perez in P4 and Lance Stroll in P5, Perez surprisingly lead the duo despite his RP20 not carrying the same aero upgrades afforded to Stroll for this race.

Esteban Ocon rounded out the top six falling just short of the 1:35.000s mark, his best time of 1:36.021 was just two tenths quicker than Alpha Tauri’s Daniil Kyvat in P7 who ran exclusively on Medium tyres.

Red Bull’s Alex Albon was just two hundredths behind Kyvat on the Soft tyre, but finished ahead of Sebastian Vettel P9 and Pierre Gasly in P10.

A rare spin for Carlos Sainz brought out the first stoppage to the session within the first 30 minutes, the Spaniard left the track at Turn 7 slamming his McLaren’s rear wing into the barriers leaving a trail of debris, enough to warrant yellow flags as Sainz limped back to the pits.

Sainz managed to hold P12 for the session ahead of Lando Norris’ sister McLaren in P13, from the Alfa Romeo’s of Antonio Giovinazzi and Kimi Räikkönen in P14 and P15 respectively.

Later, Nicholas Latifi went off similarly to Sainz at Turn 10, but his Williams suffered far more damage, red-flagging the session.

Latifi’s teammate George Russell managed P17, the Brit sandwiched between the Haas cars of Kevin Magnussen in P16 and Romain Grosjean P18.