Ahead of today's second practice session, the air temperature is 16 degrees C, while the track temperature is 26 degrees. It remains sunny but with quite a lot of heavy cloud closing in.

Lewis Hamilton headed a McLaren 1-2 this morning with Michael Schumacher finishing third in his heavily revised Mercedes. The Red Bulls of Webber and Vettel were fourth and fifth ahead of Nico Rosberg.

Fernando Alonso was eighth quickest, sandwiched by the two Renaults, while Hulkenberg suffered an engine failure and de la Rosa was sidelined by a gearbox issue.

Tyre options this weekend are hard (prime) and soft (option).

Having made way for their team's third drivers this morning, Chandhok and Sutil are back in action this afternoon.

The lights go green and Kobayashi is first out, followed by de la Rosa, di Grassi, Petrov and Webber.

Kobayashi posts the first time of the afternoon, crossing the line at 1:23.385, teammate de la Rosa - cheered on by the partisan crowd - posts 24.197 to go second.

It was noticeable that many drivers were running all four wheels over the white line at Turn 8 this morning, and watching Sutil it appears that this will continue to be the case this afternoon.

A 22.694 sees Kubica go quickest, as de la Rosa improves with a 22.976. Petrov takes fourth (23.520), ahead of Hulkenberg, Sutil and Alguersuari. Next time around the Russian makes it a Renault 1-2, only to see the positions reversed when his Polish teammate crosses the line at 21.937.

On his first flying lap, Michael Schumacher shows that this morning's pace was no fluke, the German going second with a 21.962. Next time around he goes quickest in all three sectors, crossing the line at 21.322.

Thirteen minutes into the session, Button goes second with a 21.518, as Rosberg goes fifth (22.237). Hamilton, Alonso and Glock have yet to make an appearance.

A 21.686 sees Rosberg go third as Petrov makes full use of the wide run off areas. Elsewhere, Webber goes quickest in the first sector, crossing the line at 21.272 to go quickest. As Massa goes sixth, teammate Alonso finally leaves the pits, as does Hamilton.

Replay shows Alonso running wide at Turn 9 and something falling from the car. Elsewhere, Webber raises the benchmark with a 21.063.

On his first flying lap, Hamilton posts 21.305 to go second, demonstrating the sort of form that saw him dominate this morning's session.

As Vettel goes seventh (22.011), Hulkenberg goes wide at Turn 9, runs across the Astroturf and loses it, clouting the barriers. The German youngster is fine, but the front of the car is badly damaged. The session is red flagged.

Such is the damage to the tyre barrier, it is almost fifteen minutes before the session resumes. It's a bad day for Hulkenberg, who lost a lot of this morning's session following an engine failure.

In no time at all, everyone bar Senna (and Hulkenberg) is on track, however, the drivers appear to now be focussing on longer runs as opposed to fast times.

At half-time, it's: Webber, Hamilton, Schumacher, Button, Alonso, Rosberg, Massa, Vettel, Kubica and Liuzzi.

Massa is one of the first drivers - certainly as far as the big guns are concerned - to go out on the option tyre. The Brazilian immediately improves to second with a 21.302.

Webber, currently quickest, is also on option tyres. The Australian goes quickest in the first sector and again in the second, finally crossing the line at 20.175, almost a second better than his previous best.

With no further improvements from either Massa or Webber, it appears that the soft tyres are only good for one really hot lap.

Schumacher (soft) goes second with a 20.757, the German not actually going quickest in any particular sector. Barrichello (softs) improves to fourteenth, having posted personal bests in all three sectors.