Red Bull’s Max Verstappen heads into the race as a strong favourite for a third consecutive victory to follow his third consecutive pole.
Ferrari had looked the form team before qualifying, to the extent that McLaren’s Lando Norris – who starts third on the grid following a three-place grid penalty for impeding for Red Bull’s Sergio Perez – predicted either Charles Leclerc or Carlos Sainz would be on pole after Friday practice.
But Verstappen managed to work with his engineers to tune the car and by the final part of qualifying he was back in his usual untouchable form.
The star performance of the session, though, was arguably from Sainz, who was next best after Verstappen just 15 days after having surgery in Saudi Arabia after being diagnosed with appendicitis.
He said that the effects of the operation created an unusual feeling when he was driving the car, exactly as Williams driver Alex Albon – who had a similar experience in 2022 – had warned him.
“It’s exactly what Alex told me before jumping in the car,” Sainz said. “He said when he got his appendix removed, just with the G-Force, everything in the inside just feels like it’s moving more than normal and you need some confidence to brace the core and the body as you used to do before.
“But you get used to it. There is no pain. There is nothing to worry about. It’s just a weird feeling that you have to get used to while driving, especially these circuits.
“We’re pulling 5 or 6 Gs in some of the brakings and some of the corners. So yeah, obviously, everything is moving. But I can deal with it, and I can adapt to it also.”
Ferrari set competitive times on the race-simulation runs in second practice and Sainz said he was hopeful he might be able to challenge Verstappen in the race.
There are, however, concerns about tyre life as a result of Pirelli deploying its three softest compound options this weekend.
“First of all, it’s high degradation on the medium compound,” said Sainz. “The hard hasn’t been touched yet by anyone, so there’s a lot of unknowns.
“The biggest thing we saw is that it’s very easy to grain [tear the surface of] the medium tyre. So being in traffic behind the Red Bull might not be the best for that tyre.
“And then let’s see how the hard behaves, if the hard is a good tyre or not. The race pace has been good enough to make me believe that if I’m feeling good tomorrow, I can give it a run for the win.
“If not, we will have to keep learning and keep seeing how we can keep getting closer to Max.”
Norris starts ahead of Leclerc after the other Ferrari driver lost confidence in his car behaviour in qualifying, but McLaren believe that Red Bull and Ferrari will probably be too quick for them to challenge in the race.