Hamilton Sets Pace In Barcelona

 LEWIS Hamilton was fastest in both practice sessions for the Spanish Grand Prix, underlining his blistering form as he seeks a fourth straight Formula One race victory.
The Mercedes driver was almost half a second quicker than teammate Nico Rosberg, with Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo the best of the rest.
It was a miserable day for Red Bull teammate Sebastian Vettel, with the four-time world champion unable to take part in the afternoon session after completing only four laps in the morning following an electrical problem.
Hamilton was 0.868 seconds faster than fellow Briton Jenson Button in a Mclaren in the morning session and clocked a fastest time of 1 minute 25.524 seconds in the second session, outpacing teammate Rosberg by 0.449 seconds.
Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso was fourth in the second session, followed by teammate Kimi Raikkonen, Kevin Magnusson and McLaren teammate Button, Felipe Massa (Williams), Pastor Maldonado (Lotus) and Daniil Kvyat (Toro Rosso) in the top 10.
Vettel suffered another setback in his poor start to the season when he was forced to pull out after just four laps on the Circuit de Catalunya with an electrical problem.\
“Due to an electrical problem that has damaged the wiring loom of Car No. 1, Sebastian will not be able to take part in FP2 ...” the team said via Twitter.
The team said it would use the time to fix the defect ahead of Saturday’s third practice session and qualifying.
Overall championship leader Rosberg also experienced a technical problem, with the Mercedes hybrid system overheating, limiting the German to nine laps in the morning.
Rosberg, who won the season’s opening race in Australia when Hamilton retired with a technical defect, has a four-point lead in the standings — 79 to 75 — going into the fifth race of the season and the first in Europe.