Ferrari finished the first day of practice ehre at the Sochi Autodrome in Russia at the top of the timesheets where Sebastian Vettel led home his teammate Kimi Raikkonen, who was also at the top of the leaderboard in FP1, by over two tenths of a second.

Both men did 36 laps. They began the session on Super Soft tyres, before switching to the Ultra Soft, which they also used for the end of the long run test. Now the team will embark on the technical debrief to analyse the day's data and look for areas where improvements can be made.

“It's been a nice Friday, things ran smoothly and we had no issues,” Kimi said. “I'm happy with the car, I had a nice feeling straight away and it's always more fun when it goes like that. So far so good; but it's only Friday and we have no idea what the others are doing, but we started well and I'm quite happy. We'll try to make a good day tomorrow and then we'll go from there”.

Third quickest was the Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas who, for the second session running, beat his triple world championship winning teammate,. Lewis Hamilton, who trailed Vettel's top time by more than seven tenths of a second.

“We enjoyed plenty of useful running with both drivers having untroubled sessions - completing our planned programme,” said mercedes' James Allison. “But it's pretty clear from both the long run pace and the set-up runs that we have got a bit of work to do to be on equal terms with Ferrari. As normal we will set about cutting that gap overnight and hopefully we will have a car that is able to get the job done on Saturday and Sunday. There are clear avenues that we need to work on to make sure we are properly competitive tomorrow. If we get that right it'll be close just as it has been all year.”

Fifth and sixth were the two Red Bulls, Max Verstappen leading his teammate, Daniel Ricciardo, with Felipe Massa seventh for Williams, Nico Hulkenberg in eighth for Renault ahead of Kevin Magnussen and Sergio Perez.

The lap record around the Sochi Autodrom fell in FP2 as the grip level increased and the pace quickened, due in large part to teams switching to the Purple ultrasoft tyre, the grippiest compound in Pirelli's lineup.

Russian FP2
1. Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari, 1:34.120
2. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, +0.263
3. Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes, +0.670
4. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, +0.709
5. Max Verstappen, Red Bull, +1.420
6. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull, +1.790
7. Felipe Massa, Williams, +2.141
8. Nico Hulkenberg, Renault, +2.209
9. Kevin Magnussen, Haas, +2.386
10. Sergio Perez, Force India, +2.480
11. Esteban Ocon, Force India, +2.534
12. Fernando Alonso, McLaren, +2.645
13. Jolyon Palmer, Renault, +2.651
14. Romain Grosjean, Haas, +2.919
15. Carlos Sainz, Toro Rosso, +2.963
16. Stoffel Vandoorne, McLaren, +3.005
17. Daniil Kvyat, Toro Rosso, +3.180
18. Pascal Wehrlein, Sauber, +3.321
19. Lance Stroll, Williams, +3.627
20. Marcus Ericsson, Sauber, +3.699