‘Very difficult’ day for Hamilton at Sepang

Lewis Hamilton bemoaned a “very difficult” start to his Malaysian Grand Prix weekend as title rival Sebastian Vettel set the pace at Sepang.

Vettel clocked a lap record to go quickest in second practice with his Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen second.

Meanwhile, Mercedes endured what their head of motorsport Toto Wolff labelled “one of the worst Fridays I can remember” as Hamilton and teammate Valtteri Bottas struggled.

Both spun in the afternoon session as they were restricted in their running time due to outside factors.

First practice was delayed due to a downpour and there was no running for the first 30 minutes.

The second session was curtailed by more than 20 minutes as a red flag ended running after the Haas of Romain Grosjean had a big accident as it suffered a major puncture from hitting an uncovered drain.

Vettel is now 28 points behind Hamilton in the fight for the title, but the German shone here.

He was almost 1.5 seconds quicker than Hamilton, who was in sixth, leaving the championship leader hopeful of improvements today.

Wolff, meanwhile, insisted the uncompetitiveness of Mercedes was real and not that they were saving their true pace for today.

“The car seems to be unbalanced and that triggers consequences.

It is one of the worst Fridays I can remember.”

Grosjean crashed out when his Haas hit a drain on turn 13 which had seemingly had its cover ripped off moments earlier as Hamilton passed over. The Frenchman suffered a massive puncture as his rear-right tyre bumped over the uncovered drain and saw him hit the wall at high speed. He was able to walk away from the car.

Lewis Hamilton: struggled in practice sessions.