Nico Rosberg was fastest in practice at the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, with his team-mate Michael Schumacher finishing third to put Mercedes at the front of the Formula One grid.
Rosberg set a quickest time of 1 minute, 55.409 seconds to lead Lewis Hamilton of McLaren and Schumacher by just under half a second after two sessions.
Hamilton’s compatriot and team-mate, the defending champion Jenson Button, was fourth, ahead of Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel, who was just over 1 second off Rosberg’s pace.
Felipe Massa finished 1.1sec behind and Ferrari teammate Fernando Alonso was 1.3sec back. The Guardian
Jaime Alguesuari set the first time of the day at 2:02.757. However, he was quickly overhauled by both Ferrari drivers, Tonio Liuzzi and Jenson Button, who went quickest with a 1:56.944.
Button’s reign was short-lived as Nico Hulkenberg went quickest only to lose out to Hamilton moments later. The Brit clocked a 1:56.051, the quickest time seen at Bahrain on Friday, while Rubens Barrichello took fourth place with the two Force inida’s behind him.
Sebastian Vettel, tipped to become the 2010 world champ by Bernie Ecclestone, improved to sixth place, slotting in between the two Williams drivers while Vitaly Petrov put his Renault up into tenth. Auto Racing Daily
POS DRIVER ENTRANT TIME 1 Nico Rosberg Mercedes GP 01:55.4 2 Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes 01:55.9 3 Michael Schumacher Mercedes GP 01:55.9 4 Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 01:56.1 5 Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 01:56.5 6 Nico Hulkenberg Williams-Cosworth 01:56.5 7 Felipe Massa Ferrari 01:56.6 8 Vitaly Petrov Renault 01:56.7 9 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 01:57.1 10 Pedro de la Rosa BMW Sauber-Ferrari 01:57.3 11 Kamui Kobayashi BMW Sauber-Ferrari 01:57.4 12 Adrian Sutil Force India-Mercedes 01:57.4 13 Rubens Barrichello Williams-Cosworth 01:57.5 14 Vitantonio Liuzzi Force India-Mercedes 01:57.8 15 Robert Kubica Renault 01:58.2 16 Jaime Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari 01:59.8 17 Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 02:00.4 18 Heikki Kovalainen Lotus-Cosworth 02:00.9 19 Jarno Trulli Lotus-Cosworth 02:01.0 20 Timo Glock Virgin-Cosworth 02:02.0 21 Lucas di Grassi Virgin-Cosworth 02:02.2 22 Bruno Senna HRT-Cosworth 02:07.0 23 Sebastien Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari No Time 24 Karun Chandhok HRT-Cosworth No Time
| 
|