Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time of the first practice session of the Canadian Grand Prix weekend, with the Mercedes driver almost half a second quicker than team-mate Nico Rosberg.

Hamilton lapped the 4.361km Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in a time of 1:16.212 to end the session 0.415s faster than Rosberg. Romain Grosjean took third sport, though the Lotus driver was 1.5 seconds off the pace set by Hamilton.

Hamilton’s march to the top of the FP1 timesheet wasn’t without incident, however, and with the temporary circuit lacking grip early in the weekend the Briton was one of a number of drivers to suffer a spin. Hamilton’s came at the hairpin but he quickly recovered and was on his way again.

Fourth place in the session went to Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg, with the German’s getting to within two tenths of Grosjean’s time, the good placings perhaps signifying a step forward thanks to the new power unit Mercedes has brought this weekend.

Ferrari have also brought an upgraded power unit to the Circuit Gille Villeneuve but the best the team could achieve in the opening 90-minute session was fifth place for Sebastian Vettel who set a best time of 1:17.905, almost 1.7s adrift of Hamilton. Vettel’s team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was further back in 12th place, over two seconds off the pace of the leading Mercedes.

Williams’ Felipe Massa was sixth fastest ahead of Red Bull Racing’s Daniil Kvyat, for whom seventh place was encouraging at a circuit on which the team’s Renault power unit is expected to struggle. The second Lotus of Pastor Maldonado slotted into eighth ahead of McLaren’s Fernando Alonso and Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen, who will this weekend take a five-place grid penalty imposed by FIA race stewards following his collision with Grosjean at the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago.

Aside from the low levels of grip causing a number of drivers to overrun the track limits there were no major incidents over the 90 minutes.

2015 Canadian Grand Prix – Free Practice 1
1. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:16.212
2. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:16.627
3. Romain Grosjean Lotus 1:17.721
4. Nico Hulkenberg Force India 1:17.871
5. Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1:17.905
6. Felipe Massa Williams 1:17.985
7. Daniil Kvyat Red Bull Racing 1:18.021
8. Pastor Maldonado Lotus 1:18.026
9. Fernando Alonso McLaren 1:18.128
10. Max Verstappen Toro Rosso 1:18.257
11. Valtteri Bottas Williams 1:18.325
12. Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1:18.439
13. Sergio Perez Force India 1:18.503
14. Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull Racing 1:18.775
15. Jenson Button McLaren 1:18.786
16. Felipe Nasr Sauber 1:18.948
17. Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso 1:19.065
18: Marcus Ericsson Sauber 1:19.165
19. Roberto Merhi (Manor) 1:20.616
20. Will Stevens (Manor) 1:20.624