Webber in charge at Singapore

Free practice for the Singapore Grand Prix kicked off this evening on a damp track.

There are a few novelties this weekend with Nick Heidfeld back in business with the Sauber Team and Christian Klien replacing an ill Sakon Yamamoto in the HRT Team.

Meanwhile, Jarno Trulli and Lucas di Grassi were replaced – for this session only – respectively by Fairuz Fauzy and Jérôme d’Ambrosio.

The drivers sampled the track conditions at the start of the 90-minute practice session and then came back into the pits.

Klien was the first to start a timed lap, with 19 minutes gone, and completed it in 2’18’’621. Renault’s Vitaly Petrov took over at the front shortly afterwards with a 2’16’’337. The two of them subsequently improved and were joined on track by Schumacher and Buemi. The German posted a 2’06’’176 to take a 0.2-lead over Petrov.

Timo Glock was the next driver to come out and he quickly put his Virgin on top of the timesheets with a 2’03’’286.

The floodlights had begun to illuminate the track when the session finally got busier. At the halfway point, Alguersuari was leading from Glock, Kobayashi, Barrichello and Heidfeld. The frontrunners, apart from Felipe Massa, were still to post a time on the board.

As the track dried rapidly, lap times improved and started to dip below the 2’00’0 barrier. Kobayashi and Schumacher traded the fastest time for a while and were lapping one second quicker than the rest of the field with just 30 minutes remaining.

Some drivers fitted slick tyres in the final part of the session. Jaime Alguersuari was one of them and managed to improve to 2nd fastest. The McLaren and Red Bull drivers eventually left the pits with ten minutes remaining.

Jenson Button took over at the front thanks to a 1’56’’228. Sutil went slightly faster with a 1’56’’226 but the McLaren driver further improved and retook the lead. It was then Vettel’s turn to lead the field as he completed a lap in 1’55’’137. Alguersuari improved to P2 in the closing moments of the session

Other drivers improved under the chequered flag and Mark Webber ended the session with the fastest lap – 1’54’’589. Michael Schumacher was 2nd fastest, 0.119s down on the RBR driver. Sutil was third fastest with Vettel fourth and Alguersuari fifth.

Button, Liuzzi, Buemi, Kubica and Petrov completed the top ten.

Fernando Alonso set the 11th fastest time while Lewis Hamilton was down in 18th place.