Vallelunga European F3: Alex Lynn sets practice pace

On a wet track, but with everyone on slick tyres, the Englishman's Prema Powerteam Dallara-Mercedes was as much as two seconds clear of the opposition, before team-mate Lucas Auer trimmed the gap to just under two tenths.

Antonio Giovinazzi, usually quick in tricky conditions, went third fastest in his Double R Racing machine.

With a shower of rain falling before the two back-to-back sessions kicked off, the first period featured only half the field running on rain tyres, before the remainder joined in later on with slick Hankooks.

On a gradually drying track in the second period, slick-shod Lynn was the first to lap beneath Daniil Kvyat's session-topping time from the opening half-hour.

The Russian was one of a handful of drivers to fall off in the second session, leaving him marooned near the foot of the times, although his earlier best put him 11th overall.

Title fighters Raffaele Marciello and Felix Rosenqvist were left in the lower reaches of the top 10.

Marciello and his Prema team will not have been too concerned at the fact that the sessions were wet - they had two days of testing at Vallelunga earlier in the season before the Italian venue was added as a championship round.

But it's a different story for Rosenqvist and the Mucke Motorsport squad, who were struggling for pace in Friday's test sessions and who - in common with most of the teams - have no prior experience of the circuit.

Combined times:

Pos  Driver              Team/Car                        Time       Gap
 1.  Alex Lynn           Prema Dallara-Merc              1m39.457s
 2.  Lucas Auer          Prema Dallara-Merc              1m39.628s  +0.171s
 3.  Antonio Giovinazzi  Double R Dallara-Merc           1m40.089s  +0.632s
 4.  Harry Tincknell     Carlin Dallara-VW               1m40.203s  +0.746s
 5.  Dennis van de Laar  Van Amersfoort Dallara-VW       1m40.419s  +0.962s
 6.  Eddie Cheever       Prema Dallara-Merc              1m40.437s  +0.980s
 7.  Jordan King         Carlin Dallara-VW               1m40.487s  +1.030s
 8.  Raffaele Marciello  Prema Dallara-Merc              1m40.493s  +1.036s
 9.  Felix Rosenqvist    Mucke Dallara-Merc              1m40.573s  +1.116s
10.  Pipo Derani         Fortec Dallara-Merc             1m40.836s  +1.379s
11.  Daniil Kvyat        Carlin Dallara-VW               1m40.884s  +1.427s
12.  Lucas Wolf          URD Dallara-Merc                1m40.893s  +1.436s
13.  Alexander Sims      T-Sport Dallara-Nissan          1m40.951s  +1.494s
14.  Tom Blomqvist       EuroInternational Dallara-Merc  1m41.000s  +1.543s
15.  Felix Serralles     Fortec Dallara-Merc             1m41.158s  +1.701s
16.  Sven Muller         Van Amersfoort Dallara-VW       1m41.175s  +1.718s
17.  John Bryant-Meisner Fortec Dallara-Merc             1m41.212s  +1.755s
18.  Nicholas Latifi     Carlin Dallara-VW               1m41.414s  +1.957s
19.  Sean Gelael         Double R Dallara-Merc           1m42.159s  +2.702s
20.  Tatiana Calderon    Double R Dallara-Merc           1m42.454s  +2.997s
21.  Michael Lewis       Mucke Dallara-Merc              1m42.483s  +3.026s
22.  Jann Mardenborough  Carlin Dallara-VW               1m42.890s  +3.433s
23.  Mitchell Gilbert    Mucke Dallara-Merc              1m43.178s  +3.721s
24.  Spike Goddard       T-Sport Dallara-Nissan          1m43.573s  +4.116s
25.  Andre Rudersdorf    Ma-Con Dallara-VW               1m44.424s  +4.967s
26.  Roy Nissany         Mucke Dallara-Merc              1m44.628s  +5.171s
27.  Sandro Zeller       Jo Zeller Dallara-Merc          1m48.372s  +8.915s