Max Verstappen has given a new champion who is the big candidate to revalidate his two-time championship in the Formula 1 on the road to Jeddah, where he dominated practice on the first day of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

The Dutchman, who arrived a few hours after getting on the Red Bull why a stomach virus prevented him from traveling before, it was half a second faster compared to his partner Sergio Perez in the morning practice and then prevailed by 208 thousandths In Spanish Fernando Alonsowho had another great performance with the Aston Martin.

“I think we had a good day, but what there are still some things we can do better. However, I think we are all very close, so it will definitely not be like Bahrain.”said the winner of the first round of the season, two weeks ago at the Sakhir circuit, and this Friday he picked up the pace again.

With the best car on the grid, it was Verstappen the only driver able to drive under the minute and a half per lap barrier and has always been ahead of his Mexican teammate, who took pole position at this GP last year. When they asked Czech If the Dutch will be his main rival, the man from Guadalajara wanted: “Hopefully so! That will mean we are in a very strong position. But let’s hope some of the opposing teams come forward.”.

In addition to the great performance by Verstappen and the Austrian team, who drew 1-2 in the first practice, Aston Martin stood out. Despite Lance Stroll’s car dropping to seventh position in the second practice, in the morning the millionaire Lawrence Stroll’s team he put both of his cars in front of the Mercedes From George Russell AND Lewis Hamilton and also from Ferrari’s Charles Sainzwhich was seventh at 1.3 seconds.

The Italian team is still unable to recover from a start without a podium and with the abandonment of charles leclerc. In the second round in Saudi Arabia, held in conditions similar to those in which the race will take place and in which times have been improved with eleven riders blocked in one second, the Monegasque – who will penalize ten positions on Sunday and he had been 12th in the first, he finished ninth and the Spaniard Sainz tenth. Both were in front of Hamilton’s Mercedes but behind Nico Hulkenberg’s Haas.

For his part, Alpine -who hadn’t had a very good start to the World Cup either- he gave strong signs of improvement with Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly in fourth and sixth place, respectively, in the fastest session. Among them was Russell’s Mercedes, fifth.

The activity in Saudi Arabia will continue this Saturday with the third free practice session, scheduled for 10:30 in Argentina, where qualifying will start at 14:00, same time as Sunday’s race. Television will take care of Star+.