Hamilton tops FP1 as the Brit surprises home fans

Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton narrowly edged out McLaren’s Lando Norris to top the first of three Practice sessions ahead of this weekend’s British Grand Prix.

The Ferrari driver, who’s record round the Silverstone circuit is unmatched by any other driver with a staggering eight victories and a run of podiums dating back to 2014, went to the top of the times on the Soft tyre with a third of the session left to run.

Austrian Grand Prix winner Norris ended the session just 0.023s behind his fellow countryman while Championship leader Oscar Piastri claimed third. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, just over two tenths shy of Hamilton’s time, was an encouraging fourth as the Scuderia showed decent pace.

Mercedes’ George Russell claimed fifth while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen finished the session a lowly 10th as the Dutchman struggled with the balance of his car – calling it “unbelievable” to drive.

Nico Hulkenberg and Yuki Tsunoda sat out the session as their cars were taken over by Paul Aron and Arvid Lindblad for Kick Sauber and Red Bull respectfully. In their first outings in F1 machinery, Lindblad claimed 14^th while Aron completed the session in 17^th.

Hamilton’s season so far

The British Grand Prix has come at the right time of the season for Hamilton who equalled his best result of the year so far with fourth place at the Austrian Grand Prix and is in much need of a good result in front of home fans.

The Seven Time World Champion made the switch from Mercedes to Ferrari for the 2025 Season, but bombshell move has been much tougher than the British driver ever imagined.

The Brit has now gone over seven months without a podium finish – dating back to the 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix – and is now on his longest-ever streak of 13 races without a top three finish.

Hamilton has struggled to get to grips with both the car and the team during the majority of the season with the Brit not agreeing with certain strategy and tactic decisions made by the Scuderia.

His form this season hasn’t been helped by the lack in pace Ferrari have showed in comparison to last year with Hamilton embarrassingly being overtaken by Kick Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg with ease in the closing stages of the Spanish Grand Prix.

It hasn’t been all doom and gloom for the sport’s most successful driver as Hamilton has performed well in the first two Sprint races with Hamilton winning the Chinese Sprint Race and then claiming third in the Miami Sprint Race.

And despite the troubles, Hamilton only sits one place behind team-mate Charles Leclerc in the Driver’s Championship – albeit 28 points behind – in sixth place on 91 points.

Ferrari brought a minor upgrade to the Austrian Grand Prix weekend which seen both drivers start and finish where they qualified in third and fourth – Leclerc ahead of Hamilton – with both reasonably happy with the small uptake in performance.