HIGHLIGHTS: Watch the action from the first practice session of the new F1 season in Bahrain

Sergio Perez led the way in the first practice session of the year, as the Red Bull driver topped the timesheets of FP1 in Bahrain ahead of Fernando Alonso and team mate Max Verstappen.

Perez set a time of 1m 32.758s on the soft tyre to lead the Aston Martin of Alonso by 0.438s while Verstappen was third by 0.617s. They were followed by Lando Norris in the McLaren and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc in P5.

FP1: Perez leads Alonso in first practice session of the 2023 F1 season

Lance Stroll marked his return to the cockpit by setting the sixth-fastest despite missing much of the session with an ignition issue. On medium tyres, Mercedes rounded out the top 10.

We did see a couple of drivers veer off the track with rookie Oscar Piastri suffering a snap of oversteer early on before Carlos Sainz had a spectacular spin, ruining a set of tyres and finishing 20th for Ferrari.

Click on the video player above to relive the action from the first practice session of this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix, and join us again for FP2 at 1800 local time.