Verstappen doubles up in FP2 as Bottas has bizarre pitlane spin
The Red Bull driver held a 0.336s advantage over McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo, while Esteban Ocon was an impressive third for Alpine, 0.006s clear of reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton.
Hamilton had managed a time that was 0.077s faster than Verstappen’s effort during the soft tyre qualifying simulations but the seven-time world champion fell foul of track limits at Turn 10, resulting in his lap being deleted.
His Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas was a lowly 12th in the timesheets after suffering a bizarre spin in the pitlane.
The Finn had been carrying out a burnout as he left his pit box but lost control of his W12, pitching him into a sideways spin.
Bottas avoided hitting any team members or the pit wall during in the incident, but he did have to be helped by McLaren’s crew to get his Mercedes facing the right way again.
McLaren team manager Paul James immediately reported the incident to FIA race director Michael Masi, saying: "Michael, that's absolutely ridiculous, he could have taken our guys out there.”
Bottas and a Mercedes representative have been called to see the stewards after FP2.
Despite forecasts suggesting FP2 could be a wash-out, the afternoon running was only briefly affected by light rain, enabling the teams and drivers to crack on with their planned run programmes.
The spots of rain did catch a few drivers out early on, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, Williams’ Nicholas Latifi and Haas rookie Nikita Mazepin all having spins.
Fernando Alonso rounded out the top-five for Alpine, while Aston Martin duo Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll were split by McLaren’s Lando Norris.
Sergio Perez and Antonio Giovinazzi completed the rest of the top-10 for Red Bull and Alfa Romeos as both Ferraris missed out.
Having made a promising start to the weekend by finishing second-fastest in FP1, AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly was forced to sit out the afternoon session after Honda detected an issue with his power unit.
Click here for full second practice results for the 2021 F1 Styrian Grand Prix.
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