Max Verstappen said the chance of rain led him to skip a qualifying simulation on soft tyres during second practice at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia on Friday, Oct. 2, 2026. Instead, the Red Bull driver completed a long run and finished fourth in the session, while Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was fastest.

Verstappen said he wanted to preserve a longer run in case conditions changed. “I wanted to do a long run in case there was some rain coming in,” the four-times world champion said. His team-mate, Isack Hadjar, used soft tyres and ended less than a tenth of a second behind Leclerc.

Red Bull’s pace in the opening practice sessions followed its best result of the season so far the previous weekend. Verstappen described the start to the Malaysian weekend as positive, while noting that the circuit and conditions would require further work.

“I think we had a decent start,” Verstappen said. “It’s a tricky track, it’s really hot, there’s a lot of degradation so a lot of things to figure out but it has been a positive.” The high temperatures and tyre wear were among the factors teams had to assess at the track.

Oscar Piastri said Red Bull had looked strong, but he was also watching to see what Mercedes could do with its upgrades. He saw little separation among the leading teams during the day’s running and said McLaren had improved from the first practice session, or FP1.

“I think it looks pretty close amongst the top four teams,” Piastri said. “I think Red Bull have looked very strong through the day. I think Mercedes as well have looked strong at points and obviously Ferrari were pretty good then. “Everyone’s kind of had their turn being reasonably competitive. I think we’re maybe a tiny step behind, but we made a lot of progress from FP1. So hopefully we can keep that trend going and we’ll see where we end up.”

The second practice running came amid a busy Malaysian Grand Prix weekend at Sepang. Other reported developments included an investigation involving Lewis Hamilton and grid penalties for Hadjar, Franco Colapinto and Arvid Lindblad. Verstappen had been quickest in the first session, where drivers encountered what was described as “insane” tyre degradation.

RaceFans reported the practice story at 11:23 a.m. on Oct. 2, with an update at 11:24 a.m. The report was written by Keith Collantine, who founded the site in 2005, when it was called F1 Fanatic, and began running it full-time in 2010 after working as a motoring journalist.

Based on reporting by RaceFans.