Mercedes-Benz’s Jamie Green topped Friday’s first Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters practice session at Zandvoort in the Netherlands, beating fellow Mercedes driver Roberto Merhi to the top time.
Click here for the full first practice times.
Spaniard Roberto Merhi had looked set to secure the top time, with his 1:33.653 effort. But in the final minute of the session British driver Green posted the quickest lap, beating Merhi by 0.226 seconds.
Winner at the Nürburgring last time out, Bruno Spengler was third fastest, but was more than half a second off the pace set by Green.
In a topsy-turvy session Scot David Coulthard posted the fourth faastest time, ahead of fellow Mercedes driver Robert Wickens, who was also the last driver within a second of the top time.
The session’s only significant drama came when Ralf Schumacher, who ended the session ninth fastest, got the rear wing of his car caught in an air line when exiting the pit lane, injuring four of his HWA Team’s pit crew. All four were later taken to hospital as a precautionary measure. The incident also caused the session to be briefly red-flagged.
The quickest Audi pilot was Portugese racer Filipe Albuquerque in sixth, ahead of Audi Sport Team Rosberg team-mate Edoardo Mortara.
Scot Susie Wolff enjoyed a strong session to set the eighth fastest time. Current championship leader Gary Paffett was tenth fastest, meaning that all Mercedes’ drivers except Christian Vietoris (19th) made it into the top ten.
Frenchman Adrien Tambay had an incident late in the session when he had an off into the gravel trap, and the Audi driver ended the session in 16th.
Timo Scheider endured yet another difficult session and could only manage the 21st fastest time, the former double champion ending up some 1.892 seconds off the pace.
The second practice session from Zandvoort takes place at 0900 Berlin time (0800 GMT) on Saturday.