F1-EL2: Räikkönen takes the lead at Sepang

Kimi Räikkönen remained at the forefront during the first two free practice sessions. The winner of the Australian Grand Prix set the best time of the day at Sepang with a time of 1'36"569 on medium tyres. The times stabilized with the arrival of the rain a little over half an hour from the end of the afternoon session even if the drivers were able to return to slicks in the last minutes. Sebastian Vettel finished being the closest to the Finn with only 19 thousandths behind. Felipe Massa also progressed at a good pace since he follows less than a tenth behind.

Fernando Alonso marks the first gap in the peloton by taking fourth, four tenths off the reference time. Mark Webber set the same pace as the Asturian, failing only a few hundredths of the time. Ferrari. Romain Grosjean is in sixth, six tenths behind his teammate, but the Frenchman set good times with the intermediate tires. Nico Rosberg is the last driver less than a second behind. Paul di Resta is eighth (best time achieved on hard tires) with three thousandths ahead of Lewis Hamilton. Adrian Sutil completed the top ten but the German was only able to complete 10 laps, probably due to a mechanical problem.

McLaren fails at the gates of the top ten with Sergio Pérez 11th in front of his teammate Jenson Button who follows a few thousandths behind. Sauber drivers are still grouped with Nico Hulkenberg 13th ahead of Esteban Gutiérrez. Jean-Eric Vergne finished with the 15th fastest time ahead of Pastor Maldonado and Daniel Ricciardo. Jules Bianchi was the fastest among the new teams, even ahead of Valtteri Bottas.

The final free practice session for the Malaysian Grand Prix will be contested tomorrow from 13 p.m. (6 a.m. in France) before qualifying takes over at 16 p.m. (9 a.m.).