F1 LIVE practice results as Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen begin battle

Mercedes F1 have been urged to rethink deal with insulation firm linked to Grenfell Tower fire.

The F1 team have penned a deal with Kingspan, who made some of the insulation used in the cladding of the building.

And the deal has been described as “truly shocking” by Grenfell survivors.

Michael Gove said he was “deeply disappointed”, though Kingspan said it played no role in the design of the cladding.

“This news has shattered us,” a statement from Grenfell United, a group of survivors and bereaved families from the fire, said.

The group also urged Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team, led by Lewis Hamilton, “to immediately sever your relationship” with the company.

“It is difficult to say which one will prevail,” Bernie Ecclestone told the Mail. “I think it now depends on a little bit of good or bad luck that either of them bumps into.

“Generally, the public — and this is nothing against Lewis, he has done a first-class job — probably wants to see somebody else be world champion. That is the feeling I get from people.

“Lewis has been a bit luckier until now. Whether that luck will remain or run out we’ll have to see. Max as champion would be good for Formula One. Mercedes have been great, but it would be good if someone else came to the fore.”

1. Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) 1:29.018

2. Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes) +0.061s

3. Max Verstappen (Red Bull) +0272s

4. Yuki Tsunoda (Alpha Tauri) +0.579s

5. Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) +0.786s

“We need to outscore them by four or five points, I think, this weekend, which, looking at recent results might seem like a likely scenario. But we need to remind ourselves that McLaren have been in the fight in every race that we’ve outscored them,” Carlos Sainz says when discussing Ferrari’s battle with McLaren to claim P3 – the Scuderia are 39.5 points and need five more points than their rivals to wrap up bronze on the F1 season.

“It’s not like we were on an easy route to outscore them before their trouble in the last three races, so it’s been really tight still; we’ve just managed to make less mistakes, put everything together with both cars and outscore them.

“But I feel like here they might have the faster car and they will bring the fight down to Abu Dhabi, probably.”

That didn’t last long, Max Verstappen slices off 0.667secs from Lando Norris’ pace-setting time.

The Red Bull star is on the mediums.

Valtteri Bottas is having issues, he locks up as his tyres were not ready.

The Mercedes driver will go again, but there’s a hint of the right way to go from Lando Norris.

He’s out for the second practice on the soft tyres, while the others have taken either the mediums or hards.

The McLaren man quickly goes top, logging a 1:30.771 to go top.

“We’re still at the point with George and myself and Alex and Charles [where] there’s a lot of compliments and we get along and we chat,” Lando Norris said. “But things always change when you become competitive against each other.

“We’re still in a friendly phase because we never raced each other.

“But if all of sudden we go into next year and in the middle of the championship it’s me and Max and Lewis, I don’t think there will be as much Mr Nice Guy. That’s just the way it works.”

Bernie Ecclestone is adamant that a record eighth world title for Lewis Hamilton will not take him above Michael Schumacher in the eyes of the fans as the greatest F1 driver of all time.

“No, not at all,” Bernie Ecclestone told RTL when discussing whether Lewis Hamilton clinching a record eighth title would take him above Michael Schumacher as the greatest of all time in F1.

“In fact, I’m surprised Lewis didn’t say at the beginning of the year ‘I’m stepping down, I don’t want to win more races or World Championships than Michael’.”

Valtteri Bottas has vowed to remain ‘professional’ and keep his racing clean against Max Verstappen at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix as the title race nears a conclusion.

“Every point in this championship is obviously super important and both me and Lewis will try to get every point we can,” explained the Mercedes driver.

“But also, we are racers that have respect and I also think in that situation Max wouldn’t do the calculations and what it would do in the points.

“I don’t think anyone is going to change the way we race.

“We’re going to race as hard and as well and as professionally as we can to get the best result.”

“I was just worried that it became so long that it was… irrelevant,” said Daniel Ricciardo.

“It was hard with travel, Covid, just trying to tee up the times. I thought if it gets too long, we might just forget about it but it seems everyone was pretty excited for it.

“It’s a real thing. Zak [Brown] and Cyril are now stamped for life. It was good because a lot of people I think lost faith that it was ever going to happen but we got there, it was a good time.

“There was definitely some negotiating – design, size and all those things – but actually in the end, pretty happy with the result,” he added.