2018 German GP first practice report: Sebastian P4, Kimi P6. Ferrari distant but likely to have been holding back their true pace.

Daniel Ricciardo narrowly led the way from Lewis Hamilton in first practice for the German Grand Prix, but the Ferrari drivers didn’t show their hand. Ricciardo, who will start from the back of the grid this weekend due to a power unit change penalty, took the quickest time from Hamilton by just four-thousandths of a second. Both used the ultra-soft tyres to set their quickest times.

The Ferrari drivers spent the session on the harder soft-compound tyres, yet Sebastian Vettel ended the session within three-tenths of the Red Bull and the Mercedes. Kimi Raikkonen was almost half a second behind his team mate. That meant the quickest of the Haas drivers was within half a second of the usual top six. Romain Grosjean was seventh ahead of his team mate, and Charles Leclerc’s Sauber made it three Ferrari-powered cars in the top 10.

Several updates for Ferrari at the start of the German weekend: a new floor at Silverstone, and now changes to the engine cover for the SF71H here at Hockenheim in a bid to eek out more downforce from the car. The new engine cover was on Sebastian Vettel’s car for the opening session and has dictated the re-positioning of the car’s exhaust. Kimi Raikkonen remained with the older configuration for now.

Here are the results from the first practice session ahead of the 11th round of the 2018 Formula 1 season from Hockenheim.