It was a productive first Friday for Scuderia Ferrari HP in Melbourne's Albert Park.

The team got through its planned programme, while working on the balance of the SF-25. Charles Leclerc posted the day's best time in the second free practice session, while his new team-mate, Lewis Hamilton, was fifth overall. There is still work to do for qualifying and the race, but the team has acquired plenty of data to study overnight and decide on what changes need to be made in terms of set-up.

Charles and Lewis started the day on Medium tyres, getting to grips with the SF-25 and the Albert Park track, setting their first meaningful times of 1'17"842 and 1'18"401. Shortly after the midpoint of the session, the pair switched to Soft tyres, Leclerc posting the third best time in 1'17"461, just before the session was stopped after Oliver Bearman crashed into the barriers at turns 9 and 10, damaging his car. With ten minutes remaining, the session resumed and with Softs that were now past their best, Lewis set his fastest time of 1'18"071, to put him 12th on the time sheet before reverting to the set of Mediums used at the start. He did a total of 20 laps, while Leclerc completed 21, for a team total of 41.

In the afternoon, as in the morning, Charles and Lewis started off on Medium tyres, setting times of 1'18"434 and 1'18"546, improving to 1'17"692 and 1'18"027. After half an hour, it was time to fit Softs again to do a qualifying simulation: Lewis managed a 1'16"859 to go fifth, with Charles setting the fastest time of the day with a strong 1'16"439. For the final 20 minutes, both drivers ran with a heavy fuel load to run in race trim. The Monegasque completed 32 laps, Lewis did 31, for a team total of 63.

Charles Leclerc: The feeling in the car was good and we had a solid first day on track. There is still some margin for improvement in terms of the balance, which is the same for everyone across the paddock, given that these cars are still pretty new to all of us and we have to push to understand their limits.

It's too early to come to any conclusions. We will only get a first idea of the respective pace of all the teams in qualifying. All in all, it was a good day and we look forward to tomorrow, when we want to target pole position.

Lewis Hamilton: It's great to finally get going and start my first race weekend with Scuderia Ferrari HP. It's been a learning day as I continue to understand and get to grips with the new car. Everything is so completely different from what I've been used to for so long but that's the challenge, and I'm embracing it.

We were not completely satisfied with FP1 but we made some good progress in FP2 and got some solid longer runs in, which was important. There's still balance work to do overnight, and we're missing a bit of pace, but that's expected. It's about building step by step, maximising what we have, and continuing to push forward. Looking forward to working hard and seeing what improvements we can make tomorrow.

Check out our Friday gallery from Albert Park here.