GP2: Palmer quickest in Barcelona practice

Current GP2 Series leader Jolyon Palmer set the fastest time in free practice ahead of round two at Barcelona on Friday morning.

The DAMS driver immediately hit the top of the timesheets with a time of 1m30.798s which he then whittled down to 1m30.448s on the sixth lap during his first stint.

With the field embarking upon longer runs in the second half of the session, Palmer's early benchmark time remained unbeaten until the chequered flag.

Felipe Nasr and Stephane Richelmi finished 0.2 seconds behind the pacesetting Briton and just 0.001s separated the duo in second and third respectively.

Mitch Evans occupied fourth for the entire session and it looked as though Stoffel Vandoorne would be fifth quickest before Daniel de Jong demoted him in the closing minutes.

The McLaren starlet finished ahead of Daniel Abt and Rio Haryanto, while GP2 returnee Tom Dillmann got up to speed for Arden in claiming ninth.