Sutil aiming for more points in China

The German finished fifth in the Malaysian Grand Prix two weeks ago and says he expects to be in the hunt again given the performance level of the VJM03 so far this weekend.

"It was quite a good day," said Sutil. "The balance of the car was good and I think we looked pretty strong on both types of compound so, with this in mind, I'm expecting a similar qualifying and race performance to Malaysia."

Team-mate Vitantonio Liuzzi had a more challenging first day of practice having handed his car over to reserve driver Paul di Resta for the morning session.

"It was difficult out there today," said the Italian. "The prime tyre, which was my first run of the day, was good. The car was behaving well but then after we changed to the soft tyre we were sliding all over the place and struggling to get the temperatures in the tyres.

"It was a big frustration as the car was not there any more. It was strange as it was such a clear change from hard to soft.

"We need to look into this problem but I think we can be positive about the rest of the day as on the hard tyres we seem to be quite strong."