On Track

Plenty of laps on the opening day at Monza

Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One™ Team completed over 100 laps on the first day of the Italian Grand Prix weekend, with Nyck de Vries turning his first laps behind the wheel of the AMR22.

Nyck stood in for Sebastian for the first Free Practice session, getting acclimatised to the car and the team.

Sebastian then took over and quickly got up to speed in FP2 whilst Lance put in the team's fastest lap of the day.

Lance

Lance started his day in FP1 with a 10-lap run on the Hard tyre compound, putting in a best lap of 1.25.198.

As the session approached half-distance, he switched to the Soft tyres and improved on his second quick lap to his best time – a 1.23.688 – in a nine-lap run.

He then switched back to his Hard tyres, adding nine laps to his total on them, completing the session with 28 laps on the board and finishing in 15th place.

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Autodromo Nazionale Monza, Formula One's venerable 'Temple of Speed', commemorates 100 years of Grand Prix racing in 2022, making it one of the oldest racetracks in the world. It is also one of the fastest – and provides teams and drivers with an utterly unique, high-speed challenge.

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In FP2, Lance started with the Medium tyre and he put in a best time of 1.24.475 in the early stages.

He switched to the Soft tyre and put in a 1.23.785 – his best time of the day – before a red flag was called shortly afterwards.

When the session resumed, he added 11 laps on his Medium tyres from the start of the session, as well as five to his Soft tyres, completing a total of 27 laps in the hour of running.

Lance was 18th in the session and recorded more than a race distance of laps across the day.

"It was quite a challenging day trying to dial the car into the sweet spot around this low-downforce set-up.

"A busy job list and plenty of laps have given us a lot of data to go through tonight, so we will see where we can improve before qualifying.

"It seems quite a few drivers are facing grid penalties, so that could mix up the grid and open up more opportunities.

"Interestingly, the tow does not appear to be as strong with this generation of cars compared to last year, so that may change the dynamic of qualifying quite a bit."

Sebastian

After sitting out FP1, Sebastian wasted no time in getting on track in FP2 and on the Medium tyres he put in a 1.24.471 in a 10-lap run.

He had just left the garage on a new set of Soft compounds when the red flag was called, and remained on those tyres when the session resumed.

He put in a best lap of 1.23.731, and then completed a long run on that set of tyres lasting 16 laps, finishing in 17th position with 26 laps on the board.

"I shared the car with Nyck today and he did a good job with useful feedback. It was an interesting experience being in that role of watching in the garage and listening to what he had to say on the radio.

"When I got in the car this afternoon, it was not the easiest session. I think these 2022 cars feel quite stiff here in Monza, particularly in the corners. The new tarmac in the chicanes also feels quite different compared to previous years.

"So we still have some homework to do tonight, but I think we already know where we can find some gains and improve the car ahead of tomorrow."

Nyck

Nyck's single Free Practice session started on the Hard tyre, prioritising aerodynamic work for much of the hour's running to gather plenty of valuable data for the team.

In all, he completed 11 laps on that set of tyres with a best time of 1.26.859.

In the final part of the session, Nyck used the Soft tyres to improve his best lap to 1.24.731 before settling into a long run.

He completed 11 laps on the soft compound, and finished in 19th position at the end of his AMF1 session debut.

"Firstly, it was a real privilege to drive the AMR22 around Monza today. This is a very different circuit compared to the other venues where I have driven 2022 cars, so it was all very valuable information for me.

"It was extremely challenging because of the low-downforce set-up that we run here, which makes it difficult to compare to my previous FP1 sessions.

"We spent the first half of the session gathering aerodynamic data, before switching to the Soft tyres later on. The priority is to help the team prepare for the weekend and I think we made good progress with the work we completed."