McLaren driver Lando Norris outpaced championship rival Oscar Piastri to go quickest in the opening practice session for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

McLaren enjoyed a strong start to a weekend in which it is favourite once more, with Norris leading Piastri by just 0.019sec as the running kicked off on Friday.

Ferrari‘s Charles Leclerc was the only driver who managed to get close to the McLaren duo with the third-fastest time, slightly over two tenths off the pace.

Isack Hadjar was a surprising fourth in the Racing Bulls, although already over six tenths slower than Norris.

Lewis Hamilton was fifth quickest, but the Briton had a pretty rough start to the weekend, the seven-time champion complaining that his car wasn’t feeling good. He was over four tenths slower than team-mate Leclerc.

Ollie Bearman set the sixth-quickest time ahead of the Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli and George Russell, the latter struggling with the handling of his car on his way to the eighth-fastest time.

Max Verstappen finished nearly a second off the pace in ninth in the quickest Red Bull, with Lance Stroll completing the top 10 in the Aston Martin.

Team-mate Fernando Alonso was absent from the session due to a muscle injury, the Spaniard replaced by Aston Martin reserve Felipe Drugovich.

It is unclear if Alonso, who turned 44 last week, will be in action in FP2, although the team was confident the two-time champion would still be competing in the remainder of the weekend.

In the meantime, Drugovich went 16th quickest, three tenths off Stroll’s pace.

British driver Paul Aaron was also back at the wheel of F1 machinery, driving Nico Hülkenberg‘s Sauber.

Aaron’s day, however, came to an early finish as he had to stop on track due to a problem with his car around the halfway point of the session, finishing down at the bottom of the times with just nine laps completed.

“I’ve got a systems critical alarm,” Aaron reported.

Team-mate Gabriel Bortoleto also hit trouble, his car spending the last part of the session up on jacks in the garage.

Hungarian GP practice results