A week on from his career-best result in Austria, Liam Lawson has started the British Grand Prix on the right foot at Silverstone.
Looking to build on his sixth-placed finish at Spielberg’s Red Bull Ring, Lawson set the eighth and 10th-fastest times across the two respective sessions, with a bestlap of 1m 26.624s.
The Kiwi managed 55 laps across the first day of the Grand Prix weekend, 27 in free practice one (FP1) and 28 in free practice two (FP2).
“It was all right, it’s a good start,” Lawson said after practice. “It’s very close, like last weekend.
“We have to keep chasing it, as everybody is, but it’s a good starting place.
As a boost for the hundreds of thousands of local fans in attendance, with more than half a million expected across the weekend, it was the English drivers who topped the time charts on Friday.
McLaren’s Lando Norris was the only driver to go quicker than 1m 26s, with a fastest time of 1m 25.816s set in FP2, which came after Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton was fastest in FP1.
World championship leader Oscar Piastri was 0.470s off his McLaren teammate, while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was 0.498s back, as the duo were fourth and fifth respectively in FP2.
As a sign of how tight things have been between all 10 teams in recent grands prix, 12 cars were able to better Hamilton’s session-leading time from FP1 with their best laps in FP2.
Promisingly, both Racing Bulls cars showed pace in both practice sessions, as Lawson’s teammate Isack Hadjar managed sixth and ninth respectively for his day’s work. Hadjar’s best time, 1m 26.254s, was one tenth of a second faster than Lawson’s.
Neither Racing Bulls car, though, made use of the hard tyres across the first two practice sessions, likely meaning both will look to put in a long run in FP3 on Saturday night.
Given the combination of Silverstone’s fast and technical corners, combined with some high-speed wind gusts, more than one driver lost control of their car across both sessions.
With 11 starts across Formula Three and Formula Two, including one win and three further podiums, Lawson does not lack racing experience at Silverstone.
In FP2, Lawson’s first attempt at setting a lap time was wiped away after an incident with Haas’ Ollie Bearman, as the Brit slowed at the famous Luffield corner at turn seven. Once he was able to get a clean lap in, though, Lawson’s first effort was enough to sit sixth.
Liam Lawson arrives at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix weekend. Photo / Red Bull
As the halfway stage of FP2 approached, and a host of drivers fitted a fresh set of soft tyres, Lawson temporarily climbed to fourth, as he set his fastest times of the day, before switching back to mediums for a long run to potentially replicate Racing Bulls’ race strategy.
Earlier, Lawson was eighth-fastest in FP1 and finished 0.459s back from leader Lewis Hamilton, with a best lap of 1m 26.892s.
Fresh from victory in Austria, Norris was second, 0.023s back from Hamilton, followed by Piastri in third, 0.150s back.
While the Kiwi’s best lap time of 1m 27.351s was 0.081s faster than Verstappen in 10th, Lawson was 0.134s behind Hadjar in sixth.
Both Racing Bulls cars finished ahead of their Red Bull counterparts in FP1, as Yuki Tsunoda’s car was filled by teenage prospect Arvid Lindblad for the first session.
Lawson got through 26 laps across four separate stints in FP1, as Racing Bulls looked to settle on its race strategy and car configurations.
Taking to the track early, Lawson managed to avoid an early incident with Red Bull junior Lindblad at turn 15 and after 20 minutes went top of the leaderboard with a lap of 1m 27.676s.
Even though Lawson inevitably lost top spot, he and Hadjar were third and first respectively at the halfway stage of FP1.
With plenty of time left in the session, both Racing Bulls cars fell down the time charts, even as Lawson switched to soft tyres and set his time again to stay comfortably in the top 10.
Despite his apparent inside running to step into one of Red Bull’s four cars in 2026, Lindblad could only post the 14th-best time and was more than a second off the pace.
However, that was the 17-year-old’s first taste of driving a Formula One car, with it also being Red Bull’s RB21 – notoriously the most difficult on the grid to master.
Qualifying for the British Grand Prix gets under way at 2am on Sunday (NZT).
Alex Powell is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.
