F1MATHS: Key numbers and facts after the opening day at Zandvoort
McLaren’s Lando Norris set the benchmark in both Friday’s practice sessions, but Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso kept the Briton honest with an unexpectedly strong performance on the opening day at the Dutch Grand Prix. F1Technical’s senior writer Balazs Szabo delivers drivers’ reactions from the Zandvoort circuit.
Fastest laps - McLaren driver Lando Norris was the clear leader on the opening day at Zandvoort, having been fastest in both sessions, in FP1 with a 1’10”278 and in FP2 with a 1’09”890.
Sector times - Despite having been the quickest in FP2, Norris set the best sector time only in the last segment of the track.
The middle part of the 4.2km track saw Fernando Alonso set the best time, with Norris having been a fraction - five thousands of a second - slower. The first sector belonged to Carlos Sainz, who set a 23.999s, albeit he was unable to finish that lap due to the stoppage brought out by his team-mate Alex Albon.
Middle sector - Ferrari endured a tough opening day at the Dutch Grand Prix, prompting Charles Leclerc to brand it as the Scuderia’s worst Friday in 2025. In fact, the Scuderia was relatively competitive in the first and third sector, but struggled massively in Sector 2.
The Monegasque revealed that the SF25 basically suffered the main portion of its loss in two medium-speed corners of the middle part of the Dutch circuit.
Two softs - Having gone off the track in the opening practice, Mercedes’ Andrea Kimi Antonelli concentrated on the Soft in FP2, running two sets of C4 and so he will be the only driver to have two sets of Hard and two of Medium for the rest of the weekend.
Compounds - Formula One’s sole tyre supplier Pirelli has brought a tyre selection to Zandvoort which is a step softer than what teams had had available last year.
On the opening day at Zandvoort, drivers used a total of eight sets of Hard, 31 sets of Mediums and 38 sets of Softs. The latter provided significantly more grip than the C3 and C2 rubber, and looked less vulnerable over a heavy-fuel stint than previously anticipated, making it a potential race compound on Sunday.
Best times - Lando Norris set the quickest lap both on the soft and the medium tyre. The Briton set a 1m09.980s on the red-walled compound while he clocked the quickest C3 lap with a 1m11.294s which shows the difference in grip level between the twe soft and medium compound.
It was reigning champion Max Verstappen, who set the quickest lap on the hards with a time of 1m11.572s which was a very competitive lap on the white-walled tyre. Interestingly, the Dutchman was unable to find the performance gain on the red-walled tyres that some of his rivals were able to discover.
The most diligent one - The first practice session witnessed Lando Norris rack up the highest number of laps. The Briton completed a total of 35 laps on his way to set the quickest lap in FP1.
Meanwhile, Williams racer Carlos Sainz proved to be the most diligent driver in FP2, having racked up a total of 29 laps. The reason for the fewer laps in FP2 was the two stoppages brought out by Lance Stroll and Alex Albon.
2.232s - While gaps are usually tiny this year, there was quite big margins across the field. The 19th-placed Pierre Gasly was 2.232s separated from Lando Norris, who set the quickest lap in FP2.
The margins at the sharp end of the field were bigger than usually as well. The top three - Norris, Alonso and Piastri were within a tenth of a second, but fifth-placed Verstappen was almost six tenths off while the Ferrari duo was almost a full second adrift of Norris’ benchmark.
