Valtteri Bottas returned from the summer break to top the first session of the Belgian Grand Prix, ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly. Bottas’s Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton was down in P18, however…

Early on, a blanket of fog covered Spa-Francorchamps and the surface was damp, but the drivers reported it too dry for intermediate tyres. Rain is set to fall throughout the weekend, however, leaving teams practicing on slick tyres in FP1 but anticipating wet conditions – and the clouds did indeed unleash some rain at the very end of the session.

READ MORE: It’s time for battle to resume in the F1 title fight – but will Hamilton or Verstappen set the pace at Spa?

Verstappen set his first flying lap 30 minutes into the session and immediately put his Red Bull top on hard tyres. But soft tyres were soon bolted on by the field and Valtteri Bottas set the fastest time of 1m45.199s with just over 10 minutes remaining – Verstappen ultimately left 0.164s behind in P2.

Third-placed driver Pierre Gasly was half a second off the pace while Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was fourth for Ferrari, another 0.1s back, ahead of team mate Carlos Sainz. As for Lewis Hamilton, he was down in P18 for Mercedes having been impededed by Williams’ Nicholas Latifi on a late flying lap.

The Mercedes drivers are two of 11 who have opted to take a third new power unit for the Belgian Grand Prix. The others to have taken a new ICE and related components are Red Bull’s Perez, McLaren’s duo, both Alphatauris, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll and Alpine’s Fernando Alonso. Notably, any further engine changes will incur grid penalties for these drivers.

Perez finished fifth in this session ahead of Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel, who is itching to recover from his “bitter” Hungarian GP disqualification. Vettel’s Team mate Lance Stroll was 11th overall.

Lando Norris was next on the board, eighth fastest, and ahead of the Alpine pair of Esteban Ocon (P9) and Fernando Alonso in 10th – the Spaniard having announced on Thursday that he is set to stay with the team through 2022. Norris’s team mate Daniel Ricciardo was 12th overall.

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