Kimi Antonelli continued Mercedes’ strong start to the Spanish Grand Prix weekend by setting the pace in a tense and interrupted second practice session at Madrid’s challenging new Madring circuit.
The championship leader produced the fastest lap around the halfway mark, with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc ultimately ending the session just behind him.
The demanding 5.4km venue continued to expose the drivers to narrow margins, concrete-lined sections and precious little runoff, making outright speed a secondary concern to simply keeping the car intact.
After a cautious opening practice, the field began pushing harder in FP2 as grip improved and drivers became increasingly familiar with the hybrid street-and-purpose-built layout.
Antonelli leads the charge
Antonelli initially headed the timing screens on medium tyres with a 1m34.428s, only for Max Verstappen to briefly move ahead.
The drivers were visibly wrestling with their cars, while traffic added another layer of difficulty on the narrow circuit. Turn 17 remained a particular problem, with several drivers running wide on exit and triggering track-limits infringements.
Antonelli soon reclaimed first place with a 1m33.926s, edging FP1 pacesetter George Russell by less than a tenth.
The real qualifying-style assault began around the midpoint of the session as the soft tyres emerged. The compound proved difficult to manage, with the relentless lateral loading making it challenging to keep the rubber in its ideal operating window.
Antonelli nevertheless found another chunk of performance, lowering the benchmark to 1m33.662s.
Lindblad crash brings out the red flags
Ferrari quickly moved into contention, with Lewis Hamilton and Leclerc slotting into second and third, while Racing Bulls rookie Arvid Lindblad produced another impressive display by climbing to fourth.
His session, however, ended abruptly.
With 25 minutes remaining, Lindblad lost control and slid into the barriers at Turn 13, a medium-speed left-hander. The British rookie emerged unscathed, but the impact damaged the TecPro barrier and brought out the red flags while marshals repaired the circuit.
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The interruption effectively froze the order at the front, leaving Antonelli ahead of Leclerc and Hamilton. Lindblad retained fourth, followed by Russell and Verstappen, while Oscar Piastri was the leading McLaren in seventh.
Piastri’s afternoon was considerably more productive than that of teammate Lando Norris, whose session lasted just two laps before a transmission problem forced McLaren to undertake a gearbox change.
Yuki Tsunoda was eighth, with Esteban Ocon and Liam Lawson completing the top ten.
For the Spanish crowd, however, there was little to celebrate from the home favourites. Carlos Sainz was 16th and Fernando Alonso 17th, with Alonso’s session getting off to a delayed start while Aston Martin worked on a clutch problem.
With the Madring already proving capable of punishing the slightest error, Saturday’s running promises to be another test of nerves as much as outright pace.
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