Yas Marina, FP: Gasly sets the pace in free practice

Pierre Gasly claimed the top of the timesheets in this morning’s free practice session in Abu Dhabi with a string of stunningly quick laps early in a cooler than usual session in the emirate, easily leading home McLaren test driver Stoffel Vandoorne and ART teammate Nobuharu Matsushita.

The Red Bull tester set a number of quickest laps before stopping the clocks at 1:49.349 a third of the way into the session for a time which was a second faster than the best time of last year’s free practice: the reigning champion pushed hard but was chasing his rival all session long, Gasly seemingly able to improve his pace at will.

Most of the field kept their powder dry ahead of this evening’s qualifying, with very few drivers running off the track and no one finding the wall, to the relief of the mechanics all along the pitlane. As the temperatures crept up in the latter stages of the session there was little to bother the timesheets as most of the field concentrated on their race set ups.

Nevertheless behind the top three Alexander Rossi, Alex Lynn, Mitch Evans, Jordan King, Raffaele Marciello, Norman Nato and Arthur Pic rounded out the top ten and will be all looking to put on a show under lights in qualifying this evening.