Scuderia Ferrari HP completed a total of 103 laps on the first day of track action for the Bahrain Grand Prix, being held in Malaysia at the Sepang circuit which is back on the Formula 1 calendar for the first time since 2017.

By the end of a day that proved useful for teams and drivers to reacquaint themselves with the Malaysian circuit, Charles Leclerc had set the fastest time of all, while Lewis Hamilton was fifth. However, it would be unwise to attach too much importance to today's lap times, as the track was extremely dirty, with very low grip that gradually improved over the course of the day. The track evolution should continue tomorrow, when qualifying takes place. Today, the team worked on set-up with the SF-26, gathering data on the Medium and Soft compounds. The drivers worked on single-lap performance and also did several race preparation long runs.

Charles and Lewis began the opening session on the Medium tyres, completing nine and seven laps respectively on a track offering very little grip. As planned, they then switched to Softs. Leclerc set his best time of 1'38"367, good for fourth place, while Hamilton stopped the clocks in 1'38"590, sixth-fastest. In the final part of the session, both drivers completed a long run, with the Monegasque continuing on the Soft tyres and Lewis using the previously run Mediums. They completed 25 and 21 laps respectively, for a team total of 46.

In the second practice session, the two SF-26s repeated the programme, starting on Medium tyres to continue with set-up work. Charles and Lewis then switched to Softs and improved their lap times: Leclerc set the fastest time of the day in 1'37"528, while Hamilton posted 1'37"833 to finish fifth. The second half of the session was devoted to race preparation, with both drivers completing long runs on the Soft and Medium tyres. Charles and Lewis completed 29 and 28 laps respectively, taking the day's total to 103 laps.

Tomorrow. This evening, the team will analyse all the data collected in order to finalise the last set-up details ahead of tomorrow's qualifying session.

Charles Leclerc: We had a good day and learned a lot about this track, but there's still plenty of work ahead of us until Sunday. Our performance was good, however, we mustn't underestimate our competitors as I think they have more to show tomorrow. The field is tight, the track was quite dirty and slippery today, and I expect to see quite a significant evolution between today and qualifying. Degradation is going to be the main talking point of the weekend. Even a small difference in how you take some of the corners can make a huge difference in terms of degradation, so it should make for an interesting race.

Lewis Hamilton: It was a challenging day overall, with very little grip available on track. Finding the right balance wasn't easy but that appeared to be a common theme across the field. Throughout the sessions we explored a couple of different set up directions, and now the focus is on understanding the data and identifying the right compromise. We don't seem too far off the pace but we know there's still work to do to put the car in a better place for tomorrow.