Hamilton takes blame for accident

Hamilton lost control of his McLaren on the exit to Turn Seven and careered broadside into the tyre barriers, causing heavy damage to his car.

He climbed out of the McLaren on his own and despite his accident he still set the fourth fastest time.

The British driver said he was just pushing too hard.

"It was a shame that I ended what had been a productive day going off the circuit and hitting the barriers at Turn Seven," said Hamilton. "I was just pushing and sometimes these things happen. I am absolutely fine, and hopefully the damage to the car is not too bad.

"We would have had to change our engine and gearbox anyway so hopefully I am not going to be too unpopular with the boys in the garage. In the first session we stayed on the same set of tyres throughout.

"I flat-spotted one of them early on but, as it was only practice one, we chose to save a set of tyres, however we monitored the vibrations closely to make sure that they didn't cause any damage to the car. The circuit was obviously very dirty and continued to evolve throughout both sessions."

Hamilton finished behind teammate Heikki Kovalainen, third fastest, and the Finn said he was already comfortable with his car despite the tricky conditions.

"As this track is very hard on brakes this was the focus in the first session - just making sure we got as much data as possible and that everything was working well," he said.

"The track was very dirty and there was hardly any grip to begin with so we decided there was no point in using more than one set of prime tyres.

"In the second session we could turn our attention to general set-up work and tyre evaluation. We ran both the option and the prime and there is not that much difference. I am comfortable in the car and looking forward to the rest of the weekend."