» Hamilton quickest in opening practice session

Lewis Hamilton has kicked off the Italian Grand Prix weekend fastest ahead of old team-mate Jenson Button, who was 0.6 seconds behind his fellow countryman.

The McLarens looked competitive early on in the session, as both cars hit the top of the timesheets in the first half of the session.

Nico Rosberg finished a large 0.8 seconds behind Hamilton, just a tenth ahead of Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso who again found himself at the sharp end of the grid.

There was quite a lot of activity on track approaching the 30 minute mark, as teams took advantage of the extra set of tyres they’re allowed to use before handing them back to Pirelli.

The hard compound tyre seemed to take longer than expected to reach working temperature, most likely due to the long high-speed straights.

Marussia’s Max Chilton was the first driver to test the new Parabolica run-off, when he ran wide brushing the astroturf just 15 minutes into the session.

Kimi Raikkonen also played with the extra space at Parabolica, having his flying lap compromised by getting too close to the run-off. He was almost four-tenths off team-mate Alonso.

Sebastian Vettel was the quickest of the Red Bull’s, finishing the session a second behind Hamilton in sixth. Daniel Ricciardo was a further 1.3 seconds behind as he only managed 12 laps due to power unit issue.

The Williams cars were both out of position with Valtteri Bottas in twelfth and Felipe Massa in thirteenth, however they were among the fastest in the session through the speed trap.

There were four total reserve drivers participating in the session; Daniel Juncadella sat in for Sergio Pérez at Force India, Charles Pic for Romain Grosjean at Lotus, Giedo van der Garde for Adrian Sutil at Sauber, and Roberto Merhi for Kamui Kobayashi at Caterham.

Pérez eventually jumped back in his Force India with 20 minutes left in the session and slotted into tenth position on his first run, beating team-mate Nico Hülkenberg by nearly half a second.

Formula 1 debutant Merhi ended the session two-tenths quicker than much more experienced team-mate Marcus Ericsson, who completed 13 fewer laps than the rookie.

2014 Italian Formula 1 Grand Prix – Free Practice 1 Results:

	Driver	Team / Entry	Time	Gap	Laps
1.	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1W05	1:26.187		25
2.	Jenson Button	McLaren Mercedes MP4-29	1:26.810	+ 0.623	27
3.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1W05	1:26.995	+ 0.808	26
4.	Fernando Alonso	Scuderia Ferrari F14T	1:27.169	+ 0.982	23
5.	Kevin Magnussen	McLaren Mercedes MP4-29	1:27.228	+ 1.041	30
6.	Sebastian Vettel	Infiniti Red Bull Racing Renault RB10	1:27.271	+ 1.084	27
7.	Kimi Räikkönen	Scuderia Ferrari F14T	1:27.493	+ 1.306	27
8.	Sergio Pérez	Force India Mercedes Mercedes VJM07	1:27.687	+ 1.500	13
9.	Daniil Kvyat	Scuderia Toro Rosso Renault STR9	1:27.741	+ 1.554	33
10.	Nico Hülkenberg	Force India Mercedes Mercedes VJM07	1:28.112	+ 1.925	23
11.	Esteban Gutiérrez	Sauber F1 Team Ferrari C33	1:28.114	+ 1.927	21
12.	Valtteri Bottas	Williams Martini Racing Mercedes FW36	1:28.148	+ 1.961	20
13.	Felipe Massa	Williams Martini Racing Mercedes FW36	1:28.150	+ 1.963	21
14.	Jean-Éric Vergne	Scuderia Toro Rosso Renault STR9	1:28.300	+ 2.113	30
15.	Giedo van der Garde	Sauber F1 Team Ferrari C33	1:28.429	+ 2.242	19
16.	Daniel Ricciardo	Infiniti Red Bull Racing Renault RB10	1:28.487	+ 2.300	12
17.	Daniel Juncadella	Force India Mercedes Mercedes VJM07	1:29.192	+ 3.005	10
18.	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus F1 Team Renault E22	1:29.512	+ 3.325	24
19.	Max Chilton	Marussia F1 Team Ferrari MR03	1:30.017	+ 3.830	25
20.	Jules Bianchi	Marussia F1 Team Ferrari MR03	1:30.081	+ 3.894	27
21.	Charles Pic	Lotus F1 Team Renault E22	1:30.125	+ 3.938	23
22.	Roberto Merhi	Caterham F1 Team Renault CT05	1:30.704	+ 4.517	29
23.	Marcus Ericsson	Caterham F1 Team Renault CT05	1:30.948	+ 4.761	16