Formula 1: Liam Lawson outpaces Racing Bulls teammate Isack Hadjar in Austrian Grand Prix practice

Liam Lawson wasn’t able to start the Austrian Grand Prix weekend with top 10 practice finishes the way he did in Barcelona and Canada, but the Kiwi driver got through a solid day’s work at Spielberg’s Red Bull Ring.

The Racing Bulls driver managed a 15th-place finish in Free Practice One (FP1) and 12th in Free Practice Two (FP2), and logged a vital 65 laps to prepare for Sunday’s qualifying session, and made use of all three tyre compounds before the 71-lap Grand Prix.

“It is close,” said Lawson after practice. “We have a track that’s quite short, and always has close lap times here - on top of a season that’s been close in general.

“Quali tomorrow is going to be very tight. In terms of our situation, the car is decent. I’d say we need to keep improving it, chasing it with everyone else.

“But for now, we’re in an ok window.”

In particular, Lawson was able to finish FP2 with a long run on a single set of soft tyres, ideally recreating what he’d be faced with in the race.

Lawson’s best lap of the day, set in FP2, of 1m 5.543s saw him better Racing Bulls teammate Isack Hadjar by just 0.004s, even if he was 0.963 off the pace set by McLaren’s Lando Norris.

Norris’ best mark of 1m 4.580s set in FP2 was the fastest of the day, after Mercedes’ George Russell proved the fastest in FP1.

World championship leader Oscar Piastri was second behind his teammate in FP2, just 0.157s back from Norris, while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was third, 0.318s back.

Lawson boasts plenty of the right experience at Spielberg’s Red Bull Ring, with a Formula Three sprint race victory in 2020 and two wins in the German DTM series in 2021.

Friday’s practice sessions also saw the two Racing Bulls cars testing new wings; Lawson the front and Hadjar the rear.

The start of FP2 saw Lawson complain about an issue with his steering, and that he was being pulled to the right before he could complete his first out lap.

Racing Bulls’ mechanics were able to identify the issue as his suspension, before the Kiwi was able to return to the track once a fix was applied.

The 20 drivers will return to the track on Sunday night (NZ time) for FP3 and qualifying for Monday’s Grand Prix.

Earlier, in FP1 Lawson managed through 34 laps on his first taste of the Red Bull Ring in a Formula One car.

Those laps were set on both the medium and soft tyres, as Lawson was able to continuously improve on his times throughout the first session, and logged a best lap of 1m 6.189s.

However, despite placing outside the top 10, Lawson was just 0.647s behind Russell as the session leader, and 0.582s back from Verstappen in second.

As a sign of how small the margins are, in Canada earlier this month the gap between Verstappen in first and Lawson in eighth in FP1 was just 0.544s.

While Hadjar finished 10th, the Frenchman was just 0.079s faster than his teammate, while Lawson was 0.073s ahead of Yuki Tsunoda of Red Bull.

Those times were set, though, without two of the top drivers, as Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc sat out of FP1 for rookie Dino Beganovic, who set the 18th fastest time.

Meanwhile, Norris vacated his seat for Alexander Dunne, who impressed with a fourth-placed finish in FP1, just 0.224s off the pace in his first taste of a Formula One car.

Alex Powell is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.