Formula One title pretender Norris fastest in second Monza practice

Lando Norris was fastest in the second practice session at the Italian Grand Prix on Friday as the McLaren driver bids to cut into his teammate Osar Piastri’s handy Formula One championship lead.

Briton Norris topped the times with a fastest lap of one minute 19.878 seconds, less than one hundredth of a second faster than Ferrari’s home hope Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz of Williams.

The 25-year-old trails Piastri by 34 points in the drivers’ standings after a mechanical failure forced him out of last weekend’s Dutch GP in the final laps.

Norris will hope that a broken wing mirror early in the session won’t bring him more bad luck, although it didn’t affect his performance on Friday.

Piastri, who did not take part in the day’s first practice session, was fourth fastest, 0.181s off the pace after also suffering a damaged mirror soon after heading out onto the track. 

The Australian was just ahead of Lewis Hamilton who is trying to give Ferrari fans some joy at the Temple of Speed after a disappointing first season with the sport’s most popular team.

Hamilton, a seven-time world champion, hasn’t won a single GP and has failed to even claim a podium finish with Ferrari, who will be backed by an army of fans all weekend.

The 40-year-old is 200 points behind Piastri and has a five-place grid penalty for this weekend after failing to slow down in a yellow flag zone on his way to the grid at the Dutch GP.

He was fastest when Ferrari claimed a one-two in the first session which was interrupted for around 10 minutes after French rookie Isack Hadjar, who claimed his first F1 podium last weekend at Zandvoort, careered into the gravel and sprayed it onto the track.

Italian Kimi Antonelli, who was announced as a Mercedes driver at Monza last year, slid out of the second practice session in the opening minutes.