F1 Imola GP live commentary and updates - FP1

That's all from us - we'll see you shortly for all of the action as it happens in FP2!

We'll see you then, as we go and scout for a bit of lunch.

There's a replay of Verstappen looking less than pleased with his Red Bull machinery as he sustains a snap outside of Tosa. 

He stated earlier that he 'couldn't trust' the rear of the car - he's seventh, 0.2s behind Gasly. 

Most of the drivers appear to be seeing how far they can stretch a set of softs over a stint - with a couple on the mediums. Barring any late changes, it doesn't look like we'll get a lot of moment on the timing boards.

Bearman is out on a set of mediums; he's got the new Haas updates for this second, and Ocon will receive them for FP2. 

Sainz put his car third, just over half a tenth shy of the current fastest lap. Elsewhere at Williams, Albon had a pretty big off through the second phase of Tamburello, and skipped across the grass/gravel - plus a further moment at Rivazza.

Leclerc also had another moment at Variante Alta, as the gravel is getting rearranged fairly often in this session.

Colapinto is up to 17th, as the top 18 is currently all within a second of Piastri's pace.

Sainz remains sixth but gets within 0.2s of Piastri's lap with a purple first sector. It does seem that the Williams struggles to extract tyre performance over the final part of the lap.

Tsunoda's struggling with traffic, and has to abort another lap at Villeneuve. Hulkenberg also finds Hamilton ahead of him on the run to Piratella, and Colapinto tousles the gravel.

Hamilton is struggling to slow his Ferrari down, but nonetheless puts it in third. Norris goes second, 0.032s off Piastri on already-lapped tyres.

Albon sets the fastest first sector, but loses a bit of time in sector two and sustains a minor wide moment at Turn 14 and only goes up to eighth. 

Gasly's looking fleet of foot at the moment - he's not running that nose we showed you earlier, but nonetheless brings the car up to third with a run on the softs. 

As it stands, our top 10 is Piastri, Russell, Gasly, Sainz, Verstappen, Bortoleto, Hulkenberg, Albon, Leclerc, and Antonelli.

Norris was on course to get his car up there, but bailed from his lap after encountering traffic in the first sector.

"Helmet lift is horrible," Leclerc says, struggling to keep his head down in the car. He wants a different screen in front of the cockpit to reduce the issue.

Verstappen gets up to second, as Red Bull appears to be running with "classic" numbers on the car - type set in Futura, bordered in white.

Sainz then dispatches Verstappen from the second spot, getting within 0.3s of Russell. 

When we get to qualifying, it won't be entirely surprising to see a handful of the front-runners do their first runs on mediums - the C5 might be slower overall, but it depends how the C6s hang on through the entirety of the lap. 

Russell bolts on a fresh set of softs and turns in a 1m16.599s, with a full house of purple sectors. That's 0.526s faster than Norris, although the McLaren driver's run was on a used set.

Verstappen is on a used set, and gets close to Russell's first-sector pace, but the time begins to ebb away through the second sector - and has a twitch at the rear to only feed into 11th.

Albon goes up to third place, Gasly then usurps the Anglo-Thai to go second (on mediums!), and Antonelli then goes third himself - 0.495s off Russell's time. Sainz then goes fourth.

Leclerc has another moment at the Variante Alta (Turn 14/15) with an off as he understeers into the gravel. He gets it right on another lap and he goes fourth for now.

Hamilton then turns in a lap and sets a purple middle sector - which takes him up to third - 0.227s off Norris' pace.

Bortoleto has a few grievances with his Sauber and asks the team to check the ride height. "It's bottoming like crazy," the Brazilian says, as he's audibly scraping the ground at the start-finish straight.

Meanwhile, Colapinto posts another lap on medium tyres, just looking to get his eye in at the moment - and it's faster, and good enough for 13th.

Tsunoda now goes top with a 1m18.538s on his first tour of Imola in this session. It's a circuit he knows well, from various runs in old machinery with his former RB team - which is based just up the road.

Alonso then sets a 1m18.281s to go top, this time unimpeded by Leclerc.

Alpine front wing

Another change at Alpine: Colapinto is running with the old front wing, while Pierre Gasly looks set to try the new one in FP1. Here's a side-by-side comparison - old wing on the right, 'new' one on the left (that looks very similar to the A524 front end from last year...)

Five minutes to FP1 start

This is your official alert - FP1 at Imola set to get underway very shortly.

Briatore's back, and in team leader form

With the departure of team principal Oliver Oakes, Flavio Briatore is taking on the Briton's responsibilities at Alpine.

As he's not technically an employee of the team, the controversial Italian cannot represent it in official press sessions - racing director Dave Greenwood will fill that void until further notice.

Photo by: Filip Cleeren

Colapinto returns as Doohan returns to sidelines

Franco Colapinto is back in an F1 seat this weekend, as Jack Doohan moves back to the sidelines. The Argentine is on a five-race deal to prove he deserves the seat on a full-time basis.

Franco Colapinto, Alpine

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

Colapinto, speaking yesterday: "There has been a lot of work in the background. Apart from the last couple of days, also before. I’ve been doing a lot of sim work for the team. Of course, not trackside but still helping the team to try to develop the car during race weekends.

"It has helped me a bit to learn the car, the tools, the different settings the team is running, because I’m not very used to it.

"It's been a really long time since I’ve been in a race weekend. A bit rusty maybe, but I think it’s going to come off very quickly."

Updates aplenty around the F1 field

As it's the start of the European season, the traditional unveiling of new parts has come with it. All except Williams and Sauber have registered updates on the usual FIA document sent to us.

Red Bull has new sidepods, Ferrari has a Imola-spec rear wing, as does McLaren, and Mercedes has a new front wing. Aston Martin, Haas, Racing Bulls, and Alpine have also rung plenty of changes to gain ground in the midfield battle. 

The new Red Bull bits are on top, with the Miami spec at the bottom.

Red Bull Racing RB21 technical detail, Miami GP, Emilia Romagna GP

Photo by: Getty Images

Free practice 1 at Imola

Hello everyone, welcome along to our live feed of FP1 at Imola - we've just over 25 minutes until the first session of the weekend gets underway in Italy.