Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time of the opening practice session of the Spanish Grand Prix. He set a time of 1:27.109s. Hamilton put in a strong lap in the closing minutes of the session and went past Buttons time 1:27.891. Clearly he had topped the charts with 1:27.109 under his belt. But he went round the circuit one more time and though he complained about the tyres, he managed to go past his own time and set the fastest time of the session.
Button held on to second place for McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo who managed a time of 1:27.973. Team mate and defending champion Sebastien Vettel faced problems again with his car as his session ended after just four laps when his car came to a halt on the exit of Turn 5. The change in the chassis of the car has not made any difference to the woes he's been facing.
Nico Rosberg also didn't manage to get in a huge amount of running, being confined to the pits with an ERS cooling system issue after nine laps. He was fifth fastest and just behind the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso.
The other Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen was sixth fastest ahead Kevin Magnussen while it was Pastor Maldonado who put Renault in the 8th fastest spot. Sergio Perez suffered a strange problem when his left wing mirror came loose. The mirror stayed attached and eventually fell in to the cockpit, requiring Perez to hold it clear of the steering wheel with one hand and drive with the other back to the pits.
It's an interesting beginning to the European section of the Grand Prix and Mercedes continues to show their dominance. FP2 begins in sometime from now.
