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Japanese GP: Jenson Button fastest in first practice at Suzuka

Jenson Button led a McLaren one-two as he set the pace in the opening practice session for the Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka ahead of Lewis Hamilton

Under bright sunshine on a dry track, albeit one that was slow to grip up, the Woking team dominated proceedings in the first 90 minutes. Only Red Bull's Mark Webber looked anywhere near close to the two British drivers in terms of pace.

Webber ended the morning session third fastest, ahead of the two Mercedes of Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher - embarking on his final grand prix at Suzuka.

Rosberg's W03 actually ground to halt out of Turn 4 in the final minutes of the session which effectively brought running to a premature end.

Kamui Kobayashi, who had predicted impressive performance from Sauber this weekend, was sixth fastest on the resurfaced lay-out (new asphalt is down between Turn 7 and the chicane) ahead of Ferrari's Felipe Massa and Paul di Resta in the Force India.

Nico Hulkenberg and Pastor Maldonado completed the top 10.

The McLarens looked fast from the outset, or at least as soon as cars started posting serious laptimes, which was from about half an hour in.

Hamilton was the first to go top with a 1m37.008s lap, and it was a while before anyone got close to that, partly it seemed due to the apparent low grip conditions.

Indeed several cars had lairy moments, not least Schumacher who ran wide at Degner and Grosjean who had a similar escapade at Spoon.

Halfway through the session and Webber, on the hard tyre, moved to the front in the Red Bull with a 1m34.740s. That after his own scary DRS-open moment through 130R.

The Australian remained fastest until the turn of the hour when Button, last of the front-runners to put in a proper run, set his 1m34.507s. Shortly after that Hamilton re-emerged from the pits to go 0.233s slower, making it a McLaren one-two ahead of Webber.

With most drivers then staying on the worn hard primes for their second runs, there was little further activity on the timesheets short of Schumacher's improvement to fifth.

Kimi Raikkonen was 13th in the fastest Lotus, two places behind world championship leader Fernando Alonso, while the reigning champion Sebastian Vettel was 17th. The the wry smile from the German as he removed his helmet post session suggested he was unconcerned that he was nearly 2s off the pace though.


Pos  Driver                Team                  Time               Laps
 1.  Jenson Button         McLaren-Mercedes      1m34.507s            20
 2.  Lewis Hamilton        McLaren-Mercedes      1m34.740s  + 0.233   26
 3.  Mark Webber           Red Bull-Renault      1m34.856s  + 0.349   24
 4.  Nico Rosberg          Mercedes              1m35.059s  + 0.552   18
 5.  Michael Schumacher    Mercedes              1m35.112s  + 0.615   20
 6.  Kamui Kobayashi       Sauber-Ferrari        1m35.199s  + 0.692   27
 7.  Felipe Massa          Ferrari               1m35.283s  + 0.776   24
 8.  Paul di Resta         Force India-Mercedes  1m35.299s  + 0.792   18
 9.  Nico Hulkenberg       Force India-Mercedes  1m35.474s  + 0.967   22
10.  Pastor Maldonado      Williams-Renault      1m35.478s  + 0.971   24
11.  Fernando Alonso       Ferrari               1m35.484s  + 0.977   26
12.  Sergio Perez          Sauber-Ferrari        1m35.584s  + 1.077   24
13.  Kimi Raikkonen        Lotus-Renault         1m35.691s  + 1.184   22
14.  Romain Grosjean       Lotus-Renault         1m35.724s  + 1.217   21
15.  Daniel Ricciardo      Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m36.123s  + 1.616   19
16.  Jean-Eric Vergne      Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m36.222s  + 1.715   25
17.  Sebastian Vettel      Red Bull-Renault      1m36.366s  + 1.859   23
18.  Valterri Bottas       Williams-Renault      1m36.389s  + 1.882   24
19.  Timo Glock            Marussia-Cosworth     1m37.716s  + 3.209   17 
20.  Vitaly Petrov         Caterham-Renault      1m38.295s  + 3.788   23
21.  Charles Pic           Marussia-Cosworth     1m38.616s  + 4.109   25
22.  Narain Karthikeyan    HRT-Cosworth          1m39.043s  + 4.536   25
23.  Giedo van der Garde   Caterham-Renault      1m39.374s  + 4.867   22
24.  Pedro de la Rosa      HRT-Cosworth          1m39.688s  + 5.181   19

All Timing Unofficial

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