With just six race weekends left in the 2022 Formula 1 calendar, teams realistically only have five more opportunities to conform to the new rules on testing rookies during Friday practice.
Introduced this year to encourage more teams to field upcoming talent, both regular drivers must now give up a free practice session for a driver who has made two or fewer F1 race starts.
With the Brazilian Grand Prix the final Sprint Race weekend of the year, it is unlikely any team will run a rookie in the one remaining session before jumping into qualifying a couple of hours later.
The venue for the Japanese GP, Suzuka, could be a tricky circuit to alternate drivers, considering teams will be given the opportunity to test 2023 development tyres with Pirelli. Teams might also prefer to use their regular drivers in Suzuka practice, as F1 hasn't raced there since 2019.
This leaves Singapore, Mexico, United States, and Abu Dhabi practice sessions as viable options.
Rookie FP1 runs so far...
| Team | Driver |
|---|---|
| Red Bull | While Juri Vips has already done running for the team at the Spanish GP, he was dropped by the teams young driver programme earlier this year. That leaves Liam Lawson as the likely candidate to sub in for Max Verstappen. |
| Ferrari | The team confirmed Robert Shwartzman will be competing in both United States and Abu Dhabi. |
| Mercedes | Nyck de Vries has already stood in for Lewis Hamilton during French GP FP1. The team are keen for him to get another outing, depending on his contact situation. |
| Alpine | Yet to run any driver in the allocated two sessions, as this was meant to go for Oscar Piastri. |
| McLaren | Depending on if Alpine allow them to run Piastri, team also has IndyCar drivers Colton Herta and Patricio O'Ward on standby. |
| Alfa Romeo | Zhou Guanyu's debut weekend at Bahrain counted towards this rule. As it stands Theo Pourchaire will run in place of Valtterri Bottas at either US or Mexico. |
| AlphaTauri | Team ran Lawson during the Belgium Grand Prix, but still one session remaining to replace Tsunoda. Options limited considering the Japanese driver has yet to race at the next few circuits. |
| Aston Martin | De Vries ran for the team at Monza, likely that F2 champion and newly signed development driver Felipe Drugovich will complete the running at Abu Dhabi. |
| Williams | F2 racer Logan Sergeant will run for the team at his home event in Austin, while the team already ran De Vries earlier this year at Spain. |
| Haas | Team has yet to fulfil the rookie running, but reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi likely to be the candidate in the remaining races. |
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