Hirate heads Macau practice 1

Hirate put in the best time on his final lap of practice, as most drivers spent the session acclimatising to the challenging Guia street circuit

Kazuki Nakajima, who has just been confirmed as a test driver for the WilliamsF1 team, was third quickest with his final lap - which was just three thousandths of a second slower than Streit.

British F3 Champion Mike Conway topped the times for most of the session, making the most of his experience of the circuit from his debut last year, but he was demoted to fourth overall after a flurry of quick times right at the chequered flag.

Carlin Motorsport's Sebastian Vettel was thankful to just get some laps under his belt after spending most of the first 20 minutes of the session in the pits as his mechanics worked to resolve an engine problem.

"It wasn't running properly but we managed to fix it," said Vettel, who ended up eighth overall. "At least I got out on the track, because things could have been worse. And for the few laps I did, the car feels OK."

The session was relatively incident-free. Daisuke Ikeda ended up backwards in the barriers at Lisboa after being spun around by another car, while Kazuya Oshima damaged his front left wheel and suspension after swiping the barriers at R Bend.

Pos  Driver             Car                      Time     Laps
 1.  Kohei Hirate       Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:14.887  12
 2.  Robert Streit      Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:15.432  13
 3.  Kazuki Nakajima    Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:15.435  12
 4.  Mike Conway        Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:15.457  13
 5.  Adrian Sutil       Dallara Toyota-TOM'S     2:15.724  12
 6.  Richard Antinucci  Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:15.991  13
 7.  Charlie Kimball    Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:16.194  11
 8.  Sebastian Vettel   Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:16.243   6
 9.  Marko Asmer        Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:16.409  12
10.  Kamui Kobayashi    Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:16.558  13
11.  Romain Grosjean    Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:16.971   9
12.  Kodai Tsukakoshi   Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:17.170  13
13.  Paul Di Resta      Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:17.270  13
14.  Oliver Jarvis      Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:17.300  12
15.  Sebastien Buemi    Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:17.349  12
16.  Maro Engel         Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:17.844  12
17.  Fabio Carbone      Dallara Nissan           2:17.855   8
18.  Kazuya Oshima      Dallara Toyota-TOM'S     2:18.555   7
19.  Rodolfo Avila      Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:19.639  11
20.  Daisuke Ikeda      Dallara Toyota-TOM'S     2:19.757   5
21.  Jonathan Kennard   Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:20.195  12
22.  Stephen Jelley     Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:20.392   6
23.  James Jakes        Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:20.965   7
24.  Yelmer Buurman     Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:21.204  12
25.  Maximo Cortes      Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:21.658  12
26.  Michael Ho         Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:21.848  12
27.  Mauro Massironi    Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:22.348  12
28.  Roldan Rodriguez   Dallara Mercedes-HWA     2:24.157  12
29.  Cheong Lou Meng    Dallara Honda-Mugen NB   2:24.985   8
30.  Lei Kit Meng       Dallara Opel-Spiess      2:26.747  12
31.  James Winslow      Dallara Toyota-TOM'S     2:28.304  10
32.  Jo Merszei         Dallara Toyota-Tom's     2:30.360   8