Spanish Grand Prix 2016 Qualifying: Results, Times from Friday's F1 Practice

World championship leader Nico Rosberg headed Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen in the second practice session at the Spanish Grand Prix on Friday, with his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton finishing third fastest.

Sebastian Vettel and team-mate Raikkonen were faster than Rosberg and Hamilton in the first practice session, but the Mercedes drivers improved in the afternoon when they ran on the soft tyres. 

Meanwhile, 18-year-old Max Verstappen was sixth-fastest in the morning behind team-mate Daniel Ricciardo in his first outing for Red Bull following his promotion from Toro Rosso in place of Daniil Kvyat.

Read on for a recap of the morning's action in Spain.

FP2 Recap

Here is the classification from the second practice session:

The session was halted early on in Barcelona as Renault's Jolyon Palmer drew a red flag after a puncture to his left-rear tyre.

Once back under way, Hamilton set a fastest time on the medium tyres before he was eclipsed at the top of the timesheets by Raikkonen on softs.

Rosberg then took P1 as he ran his first laps of the day on the soft tyres and held on to the top spot until the end of the session.

In Hamilton's first run on softs towards the end of the session, he had to settle for third after having trouble in the third sector.

Carlos Sainz Jr. claimed an excellent fifth in the Toro Rosso, with Red Bull's Ricciardo in sixth and team-mate Verstappen in eighth.

McLaren's Fernando Alonso did well to go seventh fastest despite having returned to the garage with a plank problem during the session, while his team-mate Jenson Button also had some issues while finishing 12th, per Formula 1:

As ever with the second practice session, many of the drivers took the opportunity to put in some long running. Kyvat managed 44 laps in his new Toro Rosso and finished 15th.

Saturday morning will see the final practice session take place ahead of the ever-vital qualifying in Barcelona.

FP1 Recap

Here is the classification from the first practice session:

World champion Hamilton and standings-leader Rosberg set the early pace on the medium tyres as they traded top spot.

However, Vettel and Raikkonen then moved to the top of the timesheets on the soft tyres. The Finn went fastest 45 minutes from the end of the session with a lap of one minute, 24.089 seconds before his team-mate overhauled him.

All eyes were on Verstappen after Red Bull took the decision to promote him in place of Kyvat for the rest of the season, with the Russian dropping down to Toro Rosso after clashing with Vettel in his home Grand Prix.

Per Formula One, Dutchman Verstappen had some early problems in his new car:

"

.@Max33Verstappen locking up at turn 1 #FP1 #SpanishGP pic.twitter.com/itC7OABORZ

— Formula 1 (@F1) May 13, 2016"

BBC Sport's Gary Rose reported acceleration problems for the young star early in the running, but he eventually found his groove to record the sixth-fastest time of the session.

Meanwhile, Kyvat was 12th fastest, four places down from new team-mate Carlos Sainz Jr., but he was always likely to struggle early on in a new car.

Force India's Sergio Perez had the biggest problem of the morning's action as he was forced to pit after smoke emerged from the back of his car as he exited Turn 9, per Formula One:

However, he managed to return to the track just before the end of the session and will be aiming to put in some decent times when the drivers return for the afternoon's action in Spain.