Montreal Practice 1: Di Resta fastest as rain welcomes Formula 1 to Canada

Rain welcomed the Formula 1 fraternity to the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, on the opening day of the Canadian Grand Prix weekend, and with it went the form book as Force India's Paul Di Resta set the fastest in the first free practice session.

It was raining steadily as the track went 'green', forcing everyone on to rain tyres, but by the end of the ninety minutes there was a distinct dry line which Di Resta maximised to set his best time of 1:21.020 with dry tyres bolted onto the VJM06. The time was six seconds off a good, dry practice time one which would expect around the track on the Ile Notre Dame.

Di Resta told BBC, "There were yellow flags in sector one, but I was very cautious through it. I'm not so sure where it comes to. We had a good run on the inters. In the dry, the car doesn't seem too bad. FP2 is going to be busy as we've got lot of tyre work to do given the forecast, but I'm looking forward to it."

"This is the worst grand prix of the year for weather, it's so unpredictable and we spend more time hiding from the rain here than anywhere else. I think anything in the top six on Sunday will be exceptional," added the Scot.

Jenson Button McLaren MP4-28

Next up was Jenson Button in the McLaren, 0.088 seconds down on the top time with Monaco bad boy Romain Grosjean third best, and Lotus teammate Kimi Raikkonen fifth. Splitting the black and gold pair was Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari.

Daniel Ricciardo was sixth on the timing sheets in the Toro Rosso, ahead of Nico Rosberg who was fastest for most of the session in wet running conditions. The Monaco winner was seventh when the flag dropped to end FP1.

McLaren's Sergio Perez was eighth at the end of the ninety minutes, ahead of Red Bull duo Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber in ninth and tenth respectively.

The big guns out of the top ten were Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa. The Mercedes driver did not get a clear run in the drier part of the session and ended the session down in 16th, with Massa 11th best.

Nico Rosberg Mercedes W04

With his teammate on the top and fastest of all, Adrian Sutil would be scratching his head wondering how he ended up down in 14th.

Considering the conditions, which created a dry line threading through wet and damp patches, the attrition was not as high as might be expected.

Neveretheless, the biggest incident occurred with five minutes remaining when Pastor Maldonado slammed the wall and destroyed (what might have been the new) front wing on his Williams. It was a woeful session for the Venezuelan who ended down in 21st, only managing to notch up 11 laps in the hour and a half.

Earlier, around the halfway mark, there was nearly a three car pile-up as Hamilton was forced take avoiding action onto the grass as Massa slowed to enter the pits, which in turn caused Webber to stamp on the brakes.

Alexander Rossi did duty in the Caterham cockpit, with Charles Pic sitting out the session. (GP247)

Subbed by AJN.

Alexander Rossi Caterham CT03