Practice 1 results

Michael Schumacher celebrated the 20th anniversary of his debut by setting the pace in a rain-disrupted practice at the Belgian Grand Prix.

The German and team-mate Nico Rosberg were the only two drivers to record a time before a heavy rain shower.

As drivers explored the wet conditions, Bruno Senna crashed, an inauspicious start to his first race weekend for Renault at Turn Nine.

Scot Paul di Resta also had a similar off at that tricky downhill corner.

That incident brought out a red flag as the session was stopped while marshals recovered the Force India from the barriers.

It was an unfortunate end to the session for Di Resta, who had never driven an F1 car at Spa before, and last experienced the track in the Formula Three Euroseries in 2005.

There was no further rain after the initial heavy shower, and a dry line began to emerge towards the end of the session, although no driver was brave enough to try 'slick' dry-weather tyres.

The fastest driver on intermediate tyres in those conditions was McLaren's Jenson Button with a lap time of two minutes 2.740 seconds - a second faster than Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel, who was running behind him on the track.

McLaren's Lewis Hamilton was fifth fastest overall, ahead of Force India's Adrian Sutil, who will be replaced in the second session by reserve driver Nico Hulkenberg.

The wet conditions meant teams were unable to learn a great deal about any upgrades they have brought to this race after the three-week mid-season break.

BBC 5 live analyst Anthony Davidson said: "There are still things you can learn, but fundamentally this is just drivers getting comfortable back in the car after the mid-season break."

Heavy rain is forecast to disrupt Friday afternoon's second session, but dry weather is predicted for qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday.
LAST FIVE BELGIAN GRAND PRIX WINNERS
Continue reading the main story
2010 - Lewis Hamilton (McLaren)
2009 - Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari)
2008 - Felipe Massa (Ferrari)
2007 - Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari)
2005 - Kimi Raikkonen (McLaren)

McLaren arrived here intending to use a new rear wing that has a more powerful straight-line speed boost when the DRS overtaking device is engaged.

But the wet conditions prevented them properly assessing its effect.

They also have a redesigned exhaust on the car in an attempt to increase downforce.

BBC F1 pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz said: "McLaren have introduced some nice new reprofiled exhausts - that's an area they have been focusing on recently. It deflects the exhaust gas through the diffuser - they're still allowed to do that and McLaren continue to explore it very aggressively."

World champions Red Bull are hoping to return to the front this weekend after failing to win since Vettel's victory in Valencia at the end of June.

BBC F1 pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz added: "The Red Bull is more Valencia specification than anything else. I don't know what the specification is on the rear suspension as they won't let me crawl under the car and have a look but I was talking to Mark Webber yesterday and he was saying they are happy with the car."

Red Bull ran some bright green 'flo-viz' paint, which allows them to see the airflow over parts of the car, on the diffuser of Webber's RB7, which suggests they may have some new designs on the floor.

Webber was 16th fastest overall, six seconds slower than team-mate Vettel, with championship rival Fernando Alonso 11th in his Ferrari.

source: bbc