MOTOR SPORT

Championship rivals Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg traded blows at the top of the order in practice for tomorrow’s United States Grand Prix.

Hamilton, who is 33 points adrift of his Mercedes team-mate Rosberg in the tussle for the title with only four rounds left, set the pace at a sun-blazed Circuit of the Americas yesterday morning.

But Rosberg usurped the Briton in the day’s second session with a best lap of 1min 37.358sec at a track where he is yet to open his winning account.

Indeed, it was Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo who split the Mercedes duo with Hamiltononly third fastest, .2sec adrift of Rosberg. Sebastian Vettel was fourth for Ferrari, with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen fifth in the order.

Hamilton, who turned on the charm offensive in Thursday’s pre-race press

“Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo split the Mercedes duo”

conference following his peculiar Snapchat antics at the previous race in Japan, is without a victory since the German Grand Prix in July and faces an uphill task to wrestle the championship momentum back in his favour.

In contrast, Rosberg, who has won four of the sport’s five races since the summer break, can now afford to finish second on three occasionsandthird at one grand prix, and still secure his maiden title.

With that in mind, Hamilton may have wanted to send out a message to his championship rival with a victory this weekend seemingly imperative in his quest for a fourth championship.

But it was Rosberg, fresh from topping every practice session in Japan a fortnight ago before securing pole position and then cruising to his ninth victory of the season, who ended the day leading the way once more.