Yamamoto pleased with his progress

The Japanese driver, who made his debut with the team in the previous race in Hungary, showed improved form compared to the Budapest event, finishing the afternoon session less than a tenth behind Sutil, although still at the bottom of the times.

"Today I am very happy as I got used to the different type of tyre and got more familiar with the car," said Yamamoto.

"We also did some long runs with a heavy fuel load, which hopefully is good for the race as I could get a feeling of how the heavier car behaved.

"We finished our whole programme and I am very satisfied but we will keep working for tomorrow."

Sutil, meanwhile, enjoyed a productive day despite the difficult conditions at the start, when the circuit was very dusty.

"Today was a fairly standard Friday practice for us," he said. "At first the track was very dirty so we tried to do some longer runs and wait for conditions to improve. Over these runs we checked temperatures and then did some set-up work.

"The car balance was not quite right as we had a lot of understeer and the tyres are very hard and difficult to use, but we will check the data tonight and do all the normal things to set it up for tomorrow.

"We should be alright as normally we manage to get a good set-up for the race and I think we should be able to do it here too."