Mercedes enjoyed another one-two in second practice at Imola with Valtteri Bottas fastest by only 0.01 seconds over Lewis Hamilton while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen suffered a stoppage that ended his session just 10 minutes in.

Second Practice saw Red Bull’s second misfortune of the day as Verstappen crawled to a stop because “something broke” 10 minutes into the hour. A brief Virtual Safety Car period followed to recover his car and he ended up 14th fastest. Up at the front the Mercedes duo led with a very competitive Pierre Gasly only  0.078s of Bottas’ pace.

Ferrari were enjoying a positive session with Carlos Sainz in 4th and Charles Leclerc 5th until Leclerc crashed to bring out a red flag at the final corner to end the session early with three minutes remaining. The top ten was rounded off by Sergio Perez, Yuki Tsunoda, Lando Norris, Antonio Giovinazzi and Lance Stroll.