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Adrian Sutil Tops Morning Practice in Bahrain

The first practice session of the 2010 Formula One season has ended, and the first blow came from Force India Mercedes' driver Adrian Sutil. The German surprised everyone by setting the fastest time in P1, managing to end the first one and a half hour of action some 0.138 seconds ahead of Ferrari's Fernando Alonso.

The first half of the session was dominated by the guys at McLaren Mercedes, who took their highly controversial MP4-25 to the top of the timing reports just before the half hour mark. It was Lewis Hamilton to set the fastest lap time first, followed by his teammate and reigning world champion Jenson Button a few laps later.

However, Ferrari's Alonso was the first man to drop under the one minute and 57 seconds mark before the one hour mark, stopping the clock at 1:56.909. Then, with only 25 minutes remaining in the P1, Sutil set a stunning 1:56.583, a lap time that would never be challenged by the leading 4 until the finish line.

Alonso further improved his time to 1:56.766, joining Sutil in being the only two drivers to drop under the 1:57 mark. Renault's Robert Kubica took his R30 to an impressive 3rd place overall, while followed by Felipe Massa and the McLaren duo (Button and Hamilton, in that order).

Force India's other driver Vitantonio Liuzzi ended the P1 in 7th place, ahead of Mercedes GP's Nico Rosberg, Red Bull's Mark Webber and 7-time world champion Michael Schumacher.

Just to give you an idea on the gap in performance between the frontrunners and the new teams, know that Lotus' duo Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen both ended the session more than 7 seconds off pace to leader Sutil. Additionally, Virgin's only racer who took the VR-01 for a run on Friday, Timo Glock, also ended the P1 more than 7 seconds behind.

The first practice also marked the first few laps of Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok in their HRT-prepared F1 single-seaters. However, they didn't compete in the P1 classification, but went ahead with a 70-minute shakedown of the car. They are expected to be a part of the practice field during P2, scheduled later today.

01. Adrian Sutil (Force India-Mercedes)                       1:56.583
02. Fernando Alonso (Ferrari)                                       1:56.766
03. Robert Kubica (Renault)                                          1:57.041
04. Felipe Massa (Ferrari)                                             1:57.055
05. Jenson Button (McLaren-Mercedes)                        1:57.068
06. Lewis Hamilton (McLaren-Mercedes)                       1:57.163
07. Vitantonio Liuzzi (Force India-Mercedes)                 1:57.194
08. Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)                                         1:57.199
09. Mark Webber (Red Bull-Renault)                              1:57.255
10. Michael Schumacher (Mercedes)                             1:57.662
11. Jaime Alguersuari (Toro Rosso-Ferrari)                    1:57.722
12. Nico Hulkenberg (Williams-Cosworth)                      1:57.894
13. Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull-Renault)                          1:57.943
14. Sebastien Buemi (Toro Rosso-Ferrari)                      1:58.399
15. Rubens Barrichello (Williams-Cosworth)                   1:58.782
16. Vitaly Petrov (Renault)                                               1:58.880
17. Pedro de la Rosa (Sauber-Ferrari)                             2:00.250
18. Kamui Kobayashi (Sauber-Ferrari)                             2:01.388
19. Timo Glock (Virgin-Cosworth)                                     2:03.680
20. Heikki Kovalainen (Lotus-Cosworth)                           2:03.848
21. Jarno Trulli (Lotus-Cosworth)                                      2:03.970
22. Lucas di Grassi (Virgin-Cosworth)
23. Bruno Senna (HRT-Cosworth)
24. Karun Chandhok (HRT-Cosworth)
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