More drama between Ocon and Red Bull! (Emilia Romagna GP FP1 Report)

The first practice session at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix weekend has come to a close and it was the number 77 Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas who topped the timesheets, good news for the Finn as he will be trying to bounce back from his disappointing end to Round 1 where he finished 37 seconds behind reigning champion, and teammate, Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton and Verstappen finished the session close behind, only one tenth separating the championship rivals.

A driver who surprised us all in FP1 was definitely Nicholas Latifi, who finished in ninth position, behind fellow countryman Lance Stroll in the Aston Martin. A team that is looking very off-colour today, must be McLaren who only managed to set the tenth, and fourteenth fastest time of the morning session.

There was drama with 20 minutes left on the clock as the Alpine of Esteban Ocon and Red Bull of Sergio Perez seemed to have tangled on the run down to Turns 5 & 6, taking them both out of the session due to damage. With no onboard footage, it is anyone's guess on what might have happened, all we know is that these two do have a history of crashing each other out, which we saw back in the Force India days.

With the midfield battle closer than ever and the Alpine and Red Bull mechanics working to fix their respective cars, it is all to play for as we go into the rest of the weekend.