Vettel leads Russia FP1 as Ricciardo hits trouble

Sebastian Vettel set the pace for Ferrari in the opening Formula 1 practice session for the Russian Grand Prix on Friday morning, edging out Red Bull's Max Verstappen by five-hundredths of a second.

Entering the weekend at the Sochi Autodrom trailing title rival Lewis Hamilton by 40 points at the top of the drivers' standings, Vettel made an impressive start to proceedings in Russia by topping the timesheets for Ferrari, setting a fastest time of 1m34.488s on the Hypersoft tyre.

Verstappen led Red Bull's charge by finishing in P2, 0.050 seconds back from Vettel, but was the team's sole runner through the second half of the session as teammate Daniel Ricciardo was sidelined by an issue on his car, forcing his crew to make some precautionary changes through the second half of the session.

Hamilton finished FP1 in third place for Mercedes, finishing three-tenths of a second back from Vettel, but completed his best lap on the Soft compound tyre. Teammate Valtteri Bottas followed suit, taking fourth place in the second Mercedes, two-tenths behind Hamilton. Ricciardo followed in sixth, having completed only 11 laps due to the issue on his car.

Esteban Ocon finished as the leading midfield driver for Force India in sixth place ahead of Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen, while Kevin Magnussen wound up eighth for Haas. Nico Hulkenberg took ninth for Renault, but was forced to pit in the final 10 minutes of the session due to an issue on his car, reported by the team to be a possible exhaust leak.

Antonio Giovinazzi's development with Sauber ahead of his step up to a race seat for 2019 continued as he took over from Marcus Ericsson for FP1, finishing the session in 10th place, three-tenths clear of teammate Charles Leclerc who was down in P14.

Romain Grosjean took 11th for Haas ahead of Toro Rosso's Pierre Gasly, while Lando Norris finished 13th for McLaren as he replaced Fernando Alonso for FP1. Norris suffered a brief spin early in the session, but managed to finish one-tenth of a second clear of Stoffel Vandoorne in the sister McLaren MCL33 in 16th.

Formula 2 racer Artem Markelov made his first F1 race weekend appearance for Renault at his home race, finishing 15th ahead of Vandoorne and Nicholas Latifi, who stepped in at Force India for Sergio Perez. Sergey Sirotkin took 18th for Williams ahead of Brendon Hartley, with Lance Stroll propping up the running order in 20th.