Shanghai, FP1: Muller sets fastest time on his first lap

The sun broke down through the early morning fog just in time to welcome the drivers as they hit the track for the first free practice.

It was an eventless session, topped by Yvan Muller who set the fastest lap of 1:51.060 on his first outing. Most of the others did pretty much the same, posting their fastest laps in the early stages.

Gabriele Tarquini ranked second, two tenths behind the leader (1:51.273), closely followed by José María López (1:51.326), Ma Qing Hua (1:51.588), Tiago Monteiro (1:51.627), Sébastien Loeb (1:51.771), Tom Chilton (1:51.790) and Norbert Michelisz (1:51.885). These seven drivers were the only ones to complete a lap under the 1:52. mark and were covered by only eight tenths.

Tom Coronel and Mehdi Bennani rounded off the top-ten, while the LADA cars struggled to be on the pace and remained at the bottom of the TC1 class.

Once again Franz Engstler was fastest in the TC2T class (1:56.804) ahead of John Filippi.
There were only a couple of thrilling moments during the session: Dušan Borković spun at T4, rejoined and pitted for replacing a broken wheelarch, while Hugo Valente outbraked himself at T14 in a cloud of smoke.

The second free practice will kick off at 10.40.