F1 Paddock Notebook - Austrian GP Friday

Recapping all of the additional news and notes following the opening day of running for the Austrian Grand Prix, Crash.net F1 Editor Luke Smith brings you his paddock notebook.

- Robert Kubica made his second free practice appearance of the season for Williams on Friday in Austria, finishing 20th, 2.5 seconds off the pace of front-runner Lewis Hamilton. Asked after the session about the good points of the Williams FW41 car, Kubica named the engine - supplied by Mercedes - and the livery.

- The FIA stewards confirmed that Sergey Sirotkin has taken a new gearbox ahead of this weekend's grand prix, permitted without penalty under the regulations as his previous gearbox had completed eight consecutive events since the start of the season.

- Technical delegate Jo Bauer also confirmed that Renault and McLaren have taken the updated Renault MGU-K for this weekend's race. However, Red Bull has opted against using the update.

- Haas was hit with a €5,000 fine for releasing Kevin Magnussen's car in an unsafe condition after failing to fully attach his front-right tyre properly. Although Magnussen did stop his car in the pit lane at the earliest opportunity, the team did not escape sanction. Team boss Gunther Steiner took one positive out of it though, saying it proved the team's new spotter system to prevent issues put in place after Australia was working.

- McLaren was also fined €10,000 for an unsafe release of Stoffel Vandoorne's car in FP1, having allowed him into the pit lane directly in front of Sebastian Vettel, forcing the Ferrari driver to slow down dramatically to avoid a collision. Some rough maths suggests this would be worth 35,714 Freddo chocolate bars.

- Friday's FIA press conference largely revolved around the recently-announced deal between Red Bull and Honda for 2019, with their representatives being joined by Toro Rosso team boss Franz Tost and Mercedes' Toto Wolff. Red Bull's Christian Horner said he saw the Honda switch as being "low risk" for Red Bull, while Wolff said he is braced for some tough fights against Red Bull-Honda in the near future.

- Christian Horner gave an update on contract talks with Daniel Ricciardo, saying they are "progressing well", with an announcement appearing to be pending. Ricciardo has long said he would like his future to be resolved by the summer break.

- Once Ricciardo's future is sorted, Horner confirmed Red Bull would then turn attention to Carlos Sainz Jr., who is on loan at Renault for this season. "Renault have a desire to keep Carlos," Horner said. "It really depends whether we have a requirement for him or not. Our intention is to retain both drivers so once that’s clear then we will sit down with Carlos."

- Toto Wolff was also asked if Mercedes would consider trying to beat Porsche's record-breaking lap of the Nordschleife, set with the Porsche 919 Hybrid Evo on Friday. "It would be interesting to put a Formula One car on the Nordschleife and see what it does, but it’s pretty more my spin than a realistic idea that somebody’s going to finance," Wolff said.

- Pierre Gasly's broken suspension on the kerb at Turn 10 resulted in the only red flag period on Friday, coming during FP2, with the Frenchman expressing his frustration over the severity of the kerbs. "I think we broke three noses today," Gasly said. "You run so much kerbs everywhere and there is lap time there and of course as a driver if you know there is lap time you are going to use it. The thing is the front wing bottoms out on these kerbs and you damage the bottom of them. We are all in this situation, and Charlie told us to make stronger front wings. At the moment there is not much we can do."