Regardless of struggling a number of moments throughout the opening follow on the Japanese Grand Prix, Lando Norris put his McLaren on prime within the one-hour session, with Mercedes driver George Russell displaying a powerful efficiency to complete second behind his McLaren rival.
It was a busy hour of follow on the Suzuka monitor lined by cherry blossom, with Lando Norris ending atop for McLaren. Nevertheless, it was not a simple session for the Briton as he suffered a couple of moments throughout the sixty minutes of follow, albeit his lap push lap on mushy tyres noticed him leap to the entrance of the leaderboard.
Mercedes driver George Russell lead the vast majority of the session, displaying an attention grabbing efficiency early on on Pirelli’s medium rubber earlier than ending up second quickest behind his fellow countryman.
Ferrari intially struggles for tempo, primarily within the opening sector, however Charles Leclerc put in a powerful lap to finish up third quickest, 4 tenths of a second behind Norris. Nevertheless, he may have been a tiny bit faster had he not encountered site visitors in Sector 3 on his lap low-fuel push lap.
His team-mate Lewis Hamilton backed up in fourth, from the Purple Bulls of Max Verstappen and TYuki sunoda. The house favorite appeared very comfy in his RB21, increase his pace on Pirelli’s yellow-banded tyres earlier than turning up his tempo on the softs.
Fernando Alonso has to this point failed to complete a race in 2025, however he displayed a promising efficiency within the opening follow in Suzuka, placing his Aston Martin in an encouraging seventh over Racing Bulls racer Isack Hadjar.
Kimi Antonelli wound up ninth, having survived a go to to the gravel on the Flip 11 hairpin late on, ending forward of Williams pair Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon.
Alpine reserve driver Ryo Hirakawa was subsequent on the timesheets, having taken over Jack Doohan’s automobile for the opening session of the weekend, giving the Japanese crowd much more to shout about alongside Tsunoda’s Purple Bull promotion.
On the eve of his return to Racing Bulls, Liam Lawson ended up thirteenth quickest, with Pierre Gasly taking P14 for Alpine.
On the again of his dominant victory at Shanghai, McLaren’s Oscar Piastri endured a troublesome session, struggling for tempo within the opening one-hour follow to finish up fifteenth on the leaderboard.
Whereas Alonso had a promising session, his team-mate Lance Stroll’s ending in P16, the Sauber duo of Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto and the Haas drivers Oliver Bearman and Esteban Ocon citing the rear of the leaderboard.
Lando Norris units the quickest time in FP1 👏
The total classification from first follow 👇#F1 #JapaneseGP pic.twitter.com/RH1ud0qNxP
— Formulation 1 (@F1) April 4, 2025
