Rosberg fastest in German GP first practice

Rosberg's time of 1m15.517s spearheaded an unsurprisingly dominant one-two for the Silver Arrows, with team-mate Lewis Hamilton 0.326 seconds adrift.

Its nearest challenger in Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel was just over a second back in third.

F1 showed just how far it has come since its last visit to Hockenheim in 2014, with 20 of the 22 drivers quicker than Rosberg's best FP1 time that year.

Rosberg himself was more than three-and—a-half seconds faster than his 1:19.131s lap in that session, when the current turbo hybrid era was only just six months old.

After losing the championship lead he had held all season last weekend in Hungary, Rosberg was quickly on the pace, leading the way early with a 1m17.030s.

With the super-soft tyres then strapped on for the second half of the session, Rosberg was able to improve by almost two seconds, and was never headed.

Reigning champion Hamilton - on a run of five wins from the last six grands prix to take the points lead from Rosberg - was not as smooth as his team-mate throughout a lap, resulting in the three-tenths deficit.

Both drivers were among the many who went off track at Turn 1, which proved particularly problematic to get right as the limits were explored.

Behind the Mercedes duo, Vettel emerged the best of the rest, just over two tenths of a second ahead of Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen.

Red Bull pair Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo were fifth and sixth quickest, separated by 0.162s.

On his 35th birthday, Fernando Alonso emerged seventh fastest in his McLaren, 1.666s down on Rosberg.

Alonso was followed by team-mate Jenson Button, seemingly underlining McLaren's recently-declared belief it is now the fourth quickest team in F1 behind Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull.

With the timesheets following a team-by-team order, Toro Rosso pair Daniil Kvyat and Carlos Sainz Jr rounded out the top 10, with both around 2.5s down.

Further down the field there were practice outings for Ferrari junior Charles Leclerc with Haas and Renault reserve Esteban Ocon.

Leclerc, standing in Esteban Gutierrez, was 17th, just three places and three tenths of a second behind Romain Grosjean.

Ocon, meanwhile, was 19th and only 0.048s behind Kevin Magnussen, with Jolyon Palmer having made way.