Barcelona GP2: Jolyon Palmer quickest in free practice

The DAMS driver immediately hit the top of the timesheets with a time of 1m30.798s which he then whittled down to 1m30.448s on the sixth lap during his first stint.

With the field embarking upon longer runs in the second half of the session, Palmer's early benchmark time remained unbeaten until the chequered flag.

Felipe Nasr and Stephane Richelmi finished 0.2 seconds behind the pacesetting Briton and just 0.001s separated the duo in second and third respectively.

Mitch Evans occupied fourth for the entire session and it looked as though Stoffel Vandoorne would be fifth quickest before Daniel de Jong demoted him in the closing minutes.

The McLaren starlet finished ahead of Daniel Abt and Rio Haryanto, while GP2 returnee Tom Dillmann got up to speed for Arden in claiming ninth.

Sergio Canamasas, who replaces Axcil Jefferies at Trident this weekend, rounded off the top 10 with a time of 1m31.650s, 1.2 seconds off the ultimate pace.

Pos  Driver               Team                Time     Gap       Laps
 1.  Jolyon Palmer        DAMS                1m30.448s           19 
 2.  Felipe Nasr          Carlin              1m30.651s  +0.203s  15 
 3.  Stephane Richelmi    DAMS                1m30.652s  +0.204s  17 
 4.  Mitch Evans          Russian Time        1m30.892s  +0.444s  17 
 5.  Daniel de Jong       MP                  1m30.951s  +0.503s  15 
 6.  Stoffel Vandoorne    ART                 1m31.460s  +1.012s  20 
 7.  Daniel Abt           Hilmer              1m31.508s  +1.060s  17 
 8.  Rio Haryanto         Caterham            1m31.510s  +1.062s  18 
 9.  Tom Dillmann         Arden               1m31.524s  +1.076s  15 
10.  Sergio Canamasas     Trident             1m31.650s  +1.202s  16 
11.  Stefano Coletti      Racing Engineering  1m31.657s  +1.209s  14 
12.  Nathanael Berthon    Lazarus             1m31.666s  +1.218s  16 
13.  Johnny Cecotto       Trident             1m31.813s  +1.365s  19 
14.  Arthur Pic           Campos              1m31.854s  +1.406s  16 
15.  Conor Daly           Lazarus             1m31.901s  +1.453s   7 
16.  Tio Ellinas          MP                  1m31.905s  +1.457s  19 
17.  Kimiya Sato          Campos              1m31.912s  +1.464s  17 
18.  Simon Trummer        Rapax               1m32.087s  +1.639s  16 
19.  Julian Leal          Carlin              1m32.128s  +1.680s  18 
20.  Alexander Rossi      Caterham            1m32.159s  +1.711s  19 
21.  Facu Regalia         Hilmer              1m32.398s  +1.950s  18 
22.  Adrian Quaife-Hobbs  Rapax               1m32.560s  +2.112s  14 
23.  Rene Binder          Arden               1m32.566s  +2.118s  17 
24.  Raffaele Marciello   Racing Engineering  1m32.640s  +2.192s  17 
25.  Artem Markelov       Russian Time        1m32.784s  +2.336s  16 
26.  Takuya Izawa         ART                 1m32.791s  +2.343s  18