Championship leader Jolyon Palmer continued his strong start to the 2014 GP2 Series season by setting the fastest time in practice under the Spanish sun. The DAMS driver’s lap of 1:30.448s was enough to finish on top, with Carlin’s Brazilian racer Felipe Nasr finishing second 0.203s adrift, while the second DAMS of Stephane Richelmi was third a further 0.001s slower.
Palmer, who won the feature race in Bahrain after a podium in the sprint race, will go into this afternoons qualifying session happy after dominating the session. Second-placed Nasr must also be happy after running the session just moments after running the Formula 1 free practice session with his Williams F1 employers.
New Zealander Mitch Evans was fourth fastest in the leading Russian Time entry, ahead of MP Motorsport’s Daniel de Jong, who impressed to finish the session fifth; the Dutchman being the final driver to dip under the 1:31s barrier.
Sixth went to Bahrain feature race winner Stoffel Vandoorne in his ART Grand Prix machine, the Belgian finishing 0.048s fastest than Hilmer Motorsport’s German driver Daniel Abt, who in turn was 0.002s faster than the leading EQ8 Caterham Racing car of Indonesian Rio Haryanto in eighth.
The two drivers making their returns to the series in Spain completed the top ten, in the form of Tom Dillmann, a last minute replacement for the injured Andre Negrao at Arden International, and Sergio Canamasas, who is making his first appearance of the season for Trident Racing.
Tio Ellinas was sixteenth in his first session as a GP2 driver, having joined MP Motorsport in place of Jon Lancaster. The Cypriot was 1.457s off the pace of Palmer up front, but got some valuable time behind the wheel. He was quicker than one of the championship favourites in Alexander Rossi however, who coming off the back of a poor weekend in Bahrain last time out for Caterham, saw himself languishing down in 20th position.
Spain Free Practice Times
| POS | DRIVER | NAT | TEAM | TIME |
| 1 | Jolyon Palmer | GBR | DAMS | 1:30.448 |
| 2 | Felipe Nasr | BRZ | Carlin | 1:30.651 |
| 3 | Stephane Richelmi | MON | DAMS | 1:30.652 |
| 4 | Mitch Evans | NZL | RT Russian Time | 1:30.892 |
| 5 | Daniel de Jong | NED | MP Motorsport | 1:30.951 |
| 6 | Stoffel Vandoorne | BEL | ART Grand Prix | 1:31.460 |
| 7 | Daniel Abt | GER | Hilmer Motorsport | 1:31.508 |
| 8 | Rio Haryanto | INO | EQ8 Caterham Racing | 1:31.510 |
| 9 | Tom Dillmann | FRA | Arden International | 1:31.524 |
| 10 | Sergio Canamasas | ESP | Trident Racing | 1:31.650 |
| 11 | Stefano Coletti | MON | Racing Engineering | 1:31.657 |
| 12 | Nathanael Berthon | FRA | Venezuela GP Lazarus | 1:31.666 |
| 13 | Johnny Cecotto Jr | VEN | Trident Racing | 1:31.813 |
| 14 | Arthur Pic | FRA | Campos Racing | 1:31.854 |
| 15 | Conor Daly | USA | Venezuela GP Lazarus | 1:31.901 |
| 16 | Tio Ellinas | CYP | MP Motorsport | 1:31.905 |
| 17 | Kimiya Sato | JAP | Campos Racing | 1:31.912 |
| 18 | Simon Trummer | SWI | Rapax | 1:32.087 |
| 19 | Julian Leal | COL | Carlin | 1:32.128 |
| 20 | Alexander Rossi | USA | EQ8 Caterham Racing | 1:32.159 |
| 21 | Facu Regalia | ARG | Hilmer Motorsport | 1:32.398 |
| 22 | Adrian Quaife-Hobbs | GBR | Rapax | 1:32.560 |
| 23 | Rene Binder | AUT | Arden International | 1:32.566 |
| 24 | Raffaele Marciello | ITA | Racing Engineering | 1:32.640 |
| 25 | Artem Markelov | RUS | RT Russian Time | 1:32.784 |
| 26 | Takuya Izawa | JAP | ART Grand Prix | 1:32.791 |
