Good morning everyone and welcome to live text commentary as Formula One comes to Monaco.

We'll be back just before 13:00 UK time for the second session, when there will be anothe r90 minutes on the clock.

Top 10: Alonso, Grosjean, Perez, Hamilton, Maldonado, Massa, Kobayashi, Button, Vettel, Rosberg

So there's a couple of minutes in theory left in the session, but they won't be used. The standings are final.

** THE SESSION WILL NOT BE RESTARTED, STEWARDS CONFIRM **

Stewards begin wheeling Kovalainen's car out of harm's way.

Normally a red flag would see the session paused - but here with time at a premium and other Formulas needing time on track, there can be no delays in the scheduling. So the time ticks on.

Clearing the Finn's car from the track will also take a little bit of time.

The smoke was starting to come as Kovalainen entered the tunnel, and he left a huge plume of it. Will not be easy to clear all that and make sure visibility is ok for the drivers. Could effectively prove to be the end of the session.

The drivers come around as Kovalainen stands somewhat forlorn by his car.

Red flag - Kovalainen has pulled up in the Caterham in a cloud of smoke just outside the tunnel.

Not magnificent from Button - but an improvement - 1:17.190 takes him up to eighth, almost a second off Alonso.

Alonso lowers the best lap again - 1:16.265. Ferrari - and Alonso particularly - looking very competitive.

Raikkonen picked up on the cameras walking down the pit lane - distinctly unlike a man who thinks he'll be on track in the next 11 minutes.

Alonso meanwhile has retaken the top spot with a 1:16.495. Massa has improved since going back out for Ferrari, too - he's sixth.

No big dramas, Lotus insist. Raikkonen has won here before, so he's happy enough with the track, but the he's not driven it since 2009.

Lotus engineers on Raikkonen's car: "We run a special steering set-up and it requires a different steering set-up. Kimi went out for the installation lap and he's very particular about the steering rack. We're changing it to his liking but it's taking time."

Button back on track, and with plenty to do. He's back in the relative no-man's land of 14th on the timesheets for now.

Still Raikkonen waits in the pits. It appears that the first session is going to be a washout for the Finn. He'll not be happy if the rain comes later on.

Alonso improves his best time of the morning, but it's only good enough to go fourth.

Aha - replays show he clipped the kerb as he went through the swimming pool section.