2020 Austrian Grand Prix

Entrants

Scuderia AlphaTauri make their debut as a constructor, having competed as Scuderia Toro Rosso from 2006 to 2019. Esteban Ocon returns to the championship with Renault, replacing Nico Hülkenberg after being out of the sport since the end of the 2018 season. Nicholas Latifi makes his competitive debut with Williams, replacing Robert Kubica, who raced for one season with Williams after returning from a serious rally crash in 2011.

Ahead of the race, Red Bull launches a protest against the Mercedes F1 W11’s dual axis steering — a system where the driver adjusts the toe of the car by pushing and pulling on the steering wheel. The system is found to be legal for 2020.

Tyre choices

Pirelli brings the C2, C3, and C4 compounds (designated hard, medium, and soft). In recognition of the need to cut costs and given the congested calendar, all drivers receive identical tyre allocations: two sets of hards, three sets of mediums, and eight sets of softs.

Practice

Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time in both FP1 and FP2. The opening session started with 30 minutes of showers, with drivers completing a few laps on intermediates before switching to dry tyres. Hamilton was over three-tenths clear of Bottas in FP1. In FP3, track temperatures reached 49 °C — considerably warmer than the previous day’s peak of 36 °C. Nicholas Latifi hit the barriers at turn 1 after 45 minutes, marking the first crash of the season. Hamilton again topped the session, 0.147 seconds ahead of Bottas.