Button pleased with afternoon progress

The British driver, who has scored just one point in 11 races this year, was nearly 2.5 seconds off the pace in the morning, but things were better in the afternoon, when the Honda racer finished 1.5 seconds off in 14th.

"Finally, at the end of the session, we seemed to find a reasonable set-up, which is something we had been struggling with throughout the day," said Button. "I'm much happier with the car now.

"This morning I didn't get a good run on either tyre. We did some laps on the option at the end of the day and that seemed to be reasonably consistent. We've made good progress over the two sessions and it seems we are getting there."

Teammate Rubens Barrichello fell victim to the loose drain cover in the afternoon session, the Brazilian damaging his car after hitting it.

Barrichello said his car didn't not handle the same after the incident, despite his team not finding any more damage.

"The day had been progressing quite well, up to the point where I hit the drain cover," Barrichello, 15th fastest, said. "We checked the car and it seemed there was no obvious problem beyond the punctured tyre and damaged wheel, but when running resumed the car didn't feel very good at all.

"We need to check everything carefully to ensure there is no underlying damage because things were going reasonably well before that and I hope we can get back to how the car felt earlier in the day."