Your move, Nico: Lewis Hamilton tops hot and fiery practice in Malaysian Formula One Grand Prix
The Briton clocked one minute, 34.944 seconds at the Sepang International Circuit, with Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg second ahead of Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen
Lewis Hamilton fired the latest shot in the close Formula One title fight against Nico Rosberg by edging his Mercedes teammate and setting the fastest time in Friday’s practice for the Malaysian Grand Prix.
Rosberg had bettered Hamilton in every on-track session in the previous race in Singapore en route to a third successive win that saw him reclaim the lead in the drivers’ championship, but Hamilton responded in the steamy conditions at the Sepang International Circuit.
His best lap time of one minute, 34.944 seconds was almost a quarter of a second better than that of Rosberg as temperatures on the resurfaced track climbed past 58 degrees Celsius.
It was briefly much hotter than that in pit lane, where a fire engulfed the Renault of Kevin Magnussen, causing the first practice session to be red flagged.
A fuel leak, which could not be stopped for several minutes, saw the fire repeatedly reignite despite the efforts of team mechanics and track marshalls, who doused the car in huge volumes of extinguisher foam.