F1 Azerbaijan GP LIVE: Practice updates and qualifying start time in Baku – UK Times

Lando Norris has the fastest time in this first practice session with a lap of 1:42.704.

Oscar Piastri claims the second spot just +0.310 behind his teammate while Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari is +0.552 behind the leader.

George Russell ends in fourth with Alex Albon of Williams a surprising fifth.

Other than a bashed in front wing which is easily replaced there’s not much else wrong with Hamilton’s Ferrari and he’s back out on track.

Lewis Hamilton has an issue. He’s the wall at turn five and the front wing is broken.

“Clipped the wall,” he radios back to his team.

“You’ve got a puncture?” comes the reply.

“Yeah, front wing as well,” Hamilton confirms.

A new fresh set of soft tyres sees Lando Norris set new fast times in sectors one and two which helps improve his time at the top of the leaderboard.

His 1:42.704 puts him over a second ahead of Verstappen now.

Oscar Piastri is making use of the time left and jumps up to third in the table +1.159 behind his teammate.

Lewis Hamilton doesn’t believe his Ferrari has the pace to challenge in the final few races of the season.

He’s had a quiet session and sits sixth in the standings +0.762 seconds behind Lando Norris.

Norris’s time is 1:43.747 and he’s just edging out Max Verstappen by four-hundreths of a second.

Lando Norris prepares to do a practice start and lets a few cars go through before he begins.

All cars in the grid are out of the pitc except for Yuki Tsunoda of Red Bull.

There’s no issues there he’s just slower to get out than the rest.

Scheduling is one of the main reasons that the time continues to tick down during a red flag in practice.

Other things take place on track following this session which means there is only an hour available for practice.

The good news is that the cars are queuing up in the pit lane waiting for the restart.

Carlos Sainz leads at the front of the pack. Oscar Piastri is back in his car too!

Oscar Piastri will be rather pleased by these developments. His car is being worked on, believed to be a faulty power unit, and he is likely to sit out the session now.

The red flag means that his opponents haven’t been able to get more time on track than him during this session.

There’s still time for the kerb issue to get resolved though but it’s taken a big chunk out of the practice.

Alan Permane, the Racing Bulls Team Principal, reports that there is a problem with the kerb at turn 16 or 17.

Part of the curb has come loose and the issue isn’t debris, as first expected, but safety.

The kerb needs to be put back in place before the cars can go back out.

Permane hopes to get his drivers out there as soon as possible as time on the track is a valuable commodity.

The pit lane is still closed with a flashing red light though there was a bit of confusion over whether the green flag had been waved.

The drivers are still waiting in their cars to get back on track with around half an hour left in the session.

The red flag remains in place for now.