Sainz laments "strange" Friday in Hungary

Ferrari's Carlos Sainz bemoaned a "strange" Friday at theHungaroring, with teams' run plans affected by rain in FP1 and anew tyre allocation. The 'Alternative Tyre Allocation' trialintroduced by F1 and Pirelli this weekend is the first of twotrials that aim to help sustainability in the sport, with only 11tyre sets allocated per car rather than 13. Hard tyres are mandatedfor Q1, Mediums for Q2 and Softs for Q3 in qualifying - anobligation that led to a number of different run plans acrosssecond practice, with FP1 having been largely washed out. Whileteammate Charles Leclerc ended FP2 fastest, Sainz could only managetenth, and spoke afterwards of an unusual day. "A very strange day,with a new tyre allocation, not being able to do as many laps asyou do on Friday because of [rain in] FP1," Sainz told media,including RacingNews365.com . "We could not really run as much aswe do on other Fridays, but is what it is. Tomorrow should beeasier." Sainz added that he felt the field would be packed closelytogether around the tight confines of the Hungaroring circuit."Gaps [between cars] are going to be close. In the last couple ofraces, we see everyone has converged a lot in development andperformance," said Sainz. "I think it's going to be a tough weekendfor everyone out there, just putting laps together, especially onsuch a tricky track, and everyone's going to be on similar racepace."