As for Vettel, who has won both races so far staged at the Middle Eastern
venue, the 24-year-old had to settle for fourth and half a second down,
although he rarely tops the first practice timesheet in his Red Bull.
Fernando Alonso was a close-run fifth in a Ferrari
that appeared to be desperately struggling with oversteer.
The Spaniard locked up and spun off at one point and twice ran wide at turn
eight at the end of the second longest straight on an F1 circuit.
Moments before Alonso’s spin, team-mate Felipe Massa did likewise at turn one,
the Brazilian carrying too much speed, leaving rubber marks for around 30
metres before he ground to a halt.
But given the vast – some would say ridiculous – run-off areas at this track,
neither man was duly punished for their errors, with the 30-year-old Massa
winding up sixth, just under a second down.
Force
India‘s Adrian Sutil was seventh, just 1.077secs adrift, with the
rest of the field someway off the pace, led by Nico Rosberg for Mercedes
fresh from having signed a new multi-year deal yesterday.
Paul di Resta was ninth, 0.8secs down on team-mate Sutil, followed by the Toro
Rossos of Jaime Alguersuari and reserve Jean-Eric Vergne.
The Red Bull protege creditably finished just a quarter of a second behind
Alguersuari as Sebastien Buemi sat out the 90-minute session.
GP2 champion and Renault
reserve Romain Grosjean, in his first outing this year for the team in place
of Bruno Senna, was 12th, just under half a second ahead of team-mate Vitaly
Petrov.
Another reserve in Robert Wickens, in his maiden outing for Virgin
Racing, brought up the rear of those who set a time.
Wickens, the Formula Renault 3.5 champion and the first Canadian since Jacques
Villeneuve in 2006 to run in a practice session, was eight seconds off
Button and less than half a second behind team- mate Timo Glock.
A technical issue resulted in Williams‘
Rubens Barrichello failing to set a time.
First practice fastest laps:
1 Jenson Button (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes 1min 40.263secs
2 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull-Renault 1:40.389
3 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren-Mercedes 1:40.403
4 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull-Renault 1:40.755
5 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Ferrari 1:40.801
6 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari 1:41.260
7 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India-Mercedes 1:41.340
8 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes GP 1:42.130
9 Paul Di Resta (Gbr) Force India-Mercedes 1:42.151
10 Jaime Alguersuari (Spa) Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1:42.377
11 Jean-Eric Vergne (Fra) Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1:42.633
12 Romain Grosjean (Swi) Renault 1:42.685
13 Vitaly Petrov (Rus) Renault 1:43.118
14 Pastor Maldonado (Ven) Williams-Cosworth 1:43.255
15 Michael Schumacher (Ger) Mercedes GP 1:43.389
16 Sergio Perez (Mex) Sauber 1:44.412
17 Kamui Kobayashi (Jpn) Sauber 1:44.484
18 Heikki Kovalainen (Fin) Lotus-Renault 1:44.565
19 Jarno Trulli (Ita) Lotus-Renault 1:44.898
20 Vitantonio Liuzzi (Ita) HRT-Cosworth 1:46.385
21 Daniel Ricciardo (Aus) HRT-Cosworth 1:46.532
22 Timo Glock (Ger) Virgin-Cosworth 1:48.024
23 Robert Wickens (Can) Virgin-Cosworth 1:48.551
24 Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Williams-Cosworth no time