Lewis Hamilton and Yuki Tsunoda suffer in Saudi as Lando Norris returns with a bang

Lando Norris returned to form in second practice for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix on an evening that will leave Lewis Hamilton scratching his head in search for answers.

Following a disappointing Bahrain Grand Prix weekend for Norris that left him in search of "a reset", notably after his performance in qualifying that ultimately compromised his race result, the McLaren driver at least delivered in FP2 under the lights of the Jeddah Corniche Circuit to tee himself up for the weekend.

A nip-and-tuck battle between a number of drivers culminated in Norris posting the leading time of 1:28.267s to finish 0.163s clear of team-mate Oscar Piastri, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen just over a further tenth of a second adrift in third.

As for Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time F1 champion finished a staggering 1.221s adrift of Norris, and eight-tenths down on Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc, who was fourth overall, leaving him a miserable 13th on the timesheet. 

In addition, Hamilton faces a stewards' investigation for impeding Alex Albon early on, an incident the Williams driver described as "dangerous".

Red Bull driver Yuki Tsunoda, meanwhile, brought out the red flags for the first and only time on Friday when he crashed into a wall at the final corner.

Compared to first practice in daylight conditions, the second session was naturally far more representative. Even though the air temperature was the same, at 29 degrees, with the sun long set, the track temperature was cooler by around 10 degrees.

As with any FP2 session, the early running saw the teams and drivers turn to Pirelli's soft compound rubber, resulting in lap times being considerably faster than those set in the first hour-long outing.

As the track ramped up, naturally the times tumbled following Verstappen's pacesetter of 1:29.896. Norris smashed that by 0.292s and after Ferrari's Charles Leclerc had split the duo, Piastri then delivered a lap one-thousandth of a second slower than the Briton.

Norris then seemed set to considerably lower his time when he purpled the first two sectors, only for a poor third to undo his good work, allowing Piastri, following behind, to shave 0.132s off the time.

Leclerc then indicated Ferrari could be in the reckoning this weekend as he took over at the top by 0.138s, only for the pecking order to change rapidly thereafter.

First, George Russell in his Mercedes, then Verstappen, Piastri, and finally Norris, all took turns at the head of affairs, with the latter ultimately emerging out in front.

Verstappen was two-tenths ahead of Leclerc, who was almost half a second down on Norris, with another two-tenths gap then to Williams' Carlos Sainz, who in FP1 had said his car felt "more alive" in the high speed.

Tsunoda managed seventh fastest before his smash, with Russell a surprising seventh given his earlier form, followed by Alpine's Pierre Gasly. The Frenchman had caused a stir in FP1 when he topped that session.

Stake's Nico Hulkenberg and Albon completed the top 10, the latter nearly a second down just ahead of Kimi Antonelli in his Mercedes.

Albon and Antonelli were two of several drivers - Piastri included - who had radioed over mini brushes with the circuit's walls prior to Tsunoda stepping over the line.

For Gabriel Bortoleto, the Stake rookie missed out on invaluable time on track given the ideal conditions. The team discovered a fuel leak just before the start of the season, forcing him to watch from the sidelines.