Welcome to coverage of the opening session of the Spanish Grand Prix.

I'll be back at 1pm UK time with coverage of FP2 - bookmark the page and join me then!

Kimi Raikkonen (Lotus) and Nico Hulkenberg (Force India) round out the top 10, with Mark Webber (Red Bull) 13th.

Kamui Kobayashi in the Sauber is third with Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton in the McLarens fourth and eighth respectively. Williams reserve driver Valtteri Bottas impresses in taking fifth spot ahead of Michael Schumacher's Mercedes, with Romain Grosjean seventh.

Fernando Alonso tops the timesheets for opening Spanish Grand Prix practice in Barcelona as Ferrari showcase an updated F2012. Alonso's time of a minute 24.430 seconds leads the way from world champion Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull as the Prancing Horse looks to take the fight to their title rivals. However Felipe Massa in the sister Ferrari was down in 12th.

The 90 minutes are up - looks like Alonso has topped the session then, for what it's worth.

Hamilton tells the team he has a lot of understeer. Alonso back out for a quick last run. /// @chrissieanne: "surely practice is for the car's benefit, would any driver go for broke before qualifying?"

Alonso's time is looking good to top this session as Vettel clocks a 1:26 on worn tyres.

Hamilton locks up his tyres at the downhill turn seven.

Vettel remains three-tenths off the pace of Alonso despite recording a few laps while Webber re-emerges. He stands 13th at present.

Raikkonen is ninth and Grosjean seventh as the former comes out on track. Lotus' double podium finish at the last race in Bahrain demonstrated the team's potential - so with Barcelona claimed to be their 'perfect track' can the team go one better and win?

Apparently he lost revs. The team did not go to the Mugello test as they were busy moving their head office to Madrid. Both McLarens out on track.

Clos's HRT comes to a halt at the entrance to the pitlane. Several mechanics run to the rescue and wheel him out of the road after Alonso has circumvented it...

How much do times really matter in practice? Do the headlines mean anything - or just set you up for a fall when you fail to convert it to race pace? /// @chrissieanne: "Would like to see Maclaren 1&2 but Vettel appears to be back on track"

Alonso improves again to 1:24.430 after a visit to the pits to change something on the front wing. Massa having work done on his front suspension.

Schumacher in sixth back out. The Ferraris come in. Button insists that he and Hamilton did the right thing in missing the Mugello test.

Vettel is in the pits with third-placed Kobayashi still lapping. Button in fourth and Bottas behind him also in the garage.

Alonso's fresh tyres do the trick as he goes P1 with 1:24.754.

Alonso just behind Massa and 11th as he finally sets a time of 1:25.446.

Button third quickest with a 1:24. The official Sauber team have tweeted about Perez's smoking car: "No problem. A heat shield was a little close to the exhaust"

Alonso didn't, in fact, set a lap-time again on that run.