Monza FP1: Perez tops as Vettel hits problems and Merc go AWOL

Perez set a time of 1:34.000 on the very last lap of the 90-minutes, with the track at its driest, to claim top spot and keep the Force India revival fairytale running.

Second place went to Kimi Raikkonen who was bumped off top spot with Perez's final lap by half a second. The Ferrari driver having a better day than his teammate Sebastian Vettel who only managed four laps due to a gearbox change. He was down in 18th.

Raikkonen did way more laps than any driver during the session, 28 in total with Perez covering the next most mileage with 18 laps on his chart.

Next up, in third was Esteban Ocon in the other pink car prompting huge smiles in the Force India garage as the team clearly have a good package for high-speed venues, in the wake of the best result to date this season in Belgium last Sunday.

Toro Rosso's Brendon Hartley also had a good run in improving conditions to set the fourth best time, a tad faster than Red Bull's Daniel Riccardo in fifth, followed by Pierre Gasly in the other Toro Rosso and Max Verstappen seventh in the sister Red Bull.

Ricciardo ran an upgraded Renault engine which gave him a scare when he unwittingly slipped the car "into a safe mode" before realising the problem.

Carlos Sainz, the quicker of the Renault boys, was eighth, a tad faster than teammate Nico Hulkenberg in ninth.

Next up were the Mercedes duo, Valtteri Bottas rounding out the top ten and Lewis Hamilton a place down in 11th, the Silver Arrows clearly keeping their powder dry with the least laps covered during the morning stanza.

McLaren reserve Lando Norris was slowest but ran only in wetter conditions earlier in the session, impressing his boss Zak Brown who pointed out that the 18-year old was about 0.3 of a second off teammate Fernando Alonso when the pair were circulating on track at the same time.