Alonso heads first practice in China
Ferrari's Fernando Alonso set the fastest time of the morning during first practice ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix. Nico Rosberg was 4 tenths slower and second fastest while Daniel Ricciardo completed the top three.
Alonso came set his best time thirty minutes into the session, enough to stay on top of the timesheet for the remaining 60 minutes. Alonso's run was in stark contrast with Kimi Raikkonen's fortunes as the Finn couldn't do more than a single installation lap with his Ferrari F14 T. The team found technical issues; requiring fixes that took the entire session's duration.
For Felipe Nasr and Giedo van der Garde it was their second free practice outing following their runs in FP1 at the Bahrain GP 2 weeks ago. Neither experienced major problems, allowing them to set the 13th and 14th fastest times.
There were problems for Esteban Gutierrez as he saw the first hour of running pass by from the garage due to a clutch problem. Marussia's Jules Bianchi meanwhile was hampered with fuel supply issues.
Results
| Pos. | No. | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 14 | Fernando Alonso | Ferrari | 1:39.783 | - | 20 |
| 2 | 6 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1:40.181 | 0.398 | 16 |
| 3 | 3 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull Racing-Renault | 1:40.772 | 0.989 | 23 |
| 4 | 22 | Jenson Button | McLaren-Mercedes | 1:40.970 | 1.187 | 23 |
| 5 | 27 | Nico Hulkenberg | Force India-Mercedes | 1:41.175 | 1.392 | 16 |
| 6 | 20 | Kevin Magnussen | McLaren-Mercedes | 1:41.366 | 1.583 | 20 |
| 7 | 25 | Jean-Eric Vergne | Str-Renault | 1:41.505 | 1.722 | 26 |
| 8 | 44 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 1:41.560 | 1.777 | 9 |
| 9 | 1 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull Racing-Renault | 1:41.629 | 1.846 | 19 |
| 10 | 19 | Felipe Massa | Williams-Mercedes | 1:41.699 | 1.916 | 14 |
| 11 | 26 | Daniil Kvyat | Str-Renault | 1:41.977 | 2.194 | 23 |
| 12 | 8 | Romain Grosjean | Lotus-Renault | 1:42.090 | 2.307 | 24 |
| 13 | 40 | Felipe Nasr | Williams-Mercedes | 1:42.265 | 2.482 | 13 |
| 14 | 36 | Giedo van der Garde | Sauber-Ferrari | 1:42.615 | 2.832 | 16 |
| 15 | 11 | Sergio Perez | Force India-Mercedes | 1:42.733 | 2.950 | 13 |
| 16 | 13 | Pastor Maldonado | Lotus-Renault | 1:43.731 | 3.948 | 22 |
| 17 | 10 | Kamui Kobayashi | Caterham-Renault | 1:44.038 | 4.255 | 16 |
| 18 | 21 | Esteban Gutierrez | Sauber-Ferrari | 1:44.162 | 4.379 | 17 |
| 19 | 17 | Jules Bianchi | Marussia-Ferrari | 1:44.270 | 4.487 | 7 |
| 20 | 4 | Max Chilton | Marussia-Ferrari | 1:44.782 | 4.999 | 20 |
| 21 | 9 | Marcus Ericsson | Caterham-Renault | 1:44.835 | 5.052 | 22 |
| 22 | 7 | Kimi Räikkönen | Ferrari | - | - | 1 |
