Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsRace weekend

Hamilton 0.5s clear in first Brazilian practice

Lewis Hamilton put his midweek troubles behind him with the fastest time of first practice for the Brazilian Grand Prix.

The triple world champion arrived late in Brazil due to a fever, while he also revealed on Thursday that recent "heavy partying" had been a cause of a car accident he was involved in on Tuesday morning in Monaco. However, Hamilton had no trouble getting up to speed quickly at Interlagos as he set the pace on Friday morning with a 1:13.543.

Sporting a new helmet design featuring an Ayrton Senna tribute on the back, Hamilton ended the session 0.519s clear of team-mate Nico Rosberg as both Mercedes drivers trialled a new s-duct on the front of their cars.

Sebastian Vettel was third quickest for Ferrari, just 0.1s slower than Rosberg and 0.3s clear of Daniel Ricciardo who was running the updated Renault power unit for Red Bull.

With rapid tyre degradation the main complaint of many drivers, Hamilton twice ran wide at the first corner during what was a largely incident-free session, though Kimi Raikkonen - who finished with the fifth fastest time, a second off the pace - was lucky to escape damage when he went off at Turn 4.

Raikkonen lost the rear of his Ferrari under braking at the end of the straight, with the car snapping to the right and putting him on the grass. Raikkonen then spun at high speed, collecting the car in the gravel before managing to rejoin the track.

Max Verstappen also had a spin at Turn 3 early in the session but still finished FP1 in eighth place behind Daniil Kvyat in sixth and Valtteri Bottas in seventh. Nico Hulkenberg and Pastor Maldonado rounded out the top ten.

2016 Lotus driver Jolyon Palmer finished just ahead of fellow Brit Jenson Button in 12th and 13th places respectively, though Palmer baulked the McLaren in the pit lane late in the session. Palmer was released at the same time as Button had been and seemed to struggle to get away quickly, with the McLaren forced to stop to avoid contact with the Lotus.

AS IT HAPPENED: Brazilian Grand Prix FP1

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Pos	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
01	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:13.543	28
02	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:14.062	36
03	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:14.168	27
04	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	1:14.449	27
05	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1:14.549	20
06	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull	1:14.696	25
07	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:14.886	25
08	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso	1:14.960	38
09	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India	1:15.174	33
10	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus	1:15.192	31
11	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso	1:15.314	38
12	Jolyon Palmer	Lotus	1:15.352	33
13	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:15.379	28
14	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:15.381	29
15	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:15.408	32
16	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	1:15.413	29
17	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:15.469	24
18	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:15.798	34
19	Alexander Rossi	Manor	1:17.860	23
20	Will Stevens	Manor	1:18.090	22

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.