F1 Belgian Grand Prix: Alonso leads first practice from Di Resta

Former two-time Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso led the timesheets at the first practice session of the F1 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps on Friday in wet conditions.

The Spaniard's time of 1:55.198 was good enough to set the pace over a single lap from Sahara Force India's Paul Di Resta and Adrian Sutil.

McLaren's Sergio Perez continued to impress in his first season with former F1 world champions McLaren by setting the fourth fastest time ahead of Mercedes AMG's Nico Rosberg.

The top ten was rounded up by three-time defending F1 world champion Sebastian Vettel in his Red Bull, Sauber's Esteban Gutierrez, teammate Nico Hulkenberg, Scuderia Toro Rosso's Daniel Ricciardo and Williams F1's Valtteri Bottas.

The run up to the opening practice session - the first competitive running for F1 after its summer break - was dominated by rumours of Lotus F1's Kimi Raikkonen moving either to Red Bull, Ferrari and even McLaren.

The 2007 world champion was able to dodge queries from the media by missing the Thursday press conference at Spa due to an alleged sickness.

Both him and Lotus F1 teammate Romain Grosjean propped up the tail of the timing sheet in a session where wet running restricted work mainly to work on we weather set up.

The weather has always been a variable at the Belgian GP with Spa-Francorchamps said to have almost its own micro-climate that leads to sudden changes.