Rosberg leads the F1 world championship by 24 points from Mercedes team-mate Hamilton and is keen to return to the top step of the rostrum in Canada after two underwhelming results in Spain and Monaco.
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The session was run on a “green” circuit following very little use and a long period of unseasonably cool and damp weather in Montreal, and it was interrupted when Brazilian Felipe Massa crashed heavily in his Williams.
Hamilton went off the track a few times, which he said is normal when testing the car’s limits.
Britain’s Lewis Hamilton looks like he’s ready for another double – pole position and race victory – at the Canadian Grand Prix.
Hamilton was gift-wrapped his victory at the rain-hit Monte Carlo race after a Red Bull pit-stop blunder on Daniel Ricciardo’s vehicle, and the Australian, who revealed he could not speak to his team in the days after the race, was only 11th fastest on Friday morning.
The Briton may well have picked the megastar’s brain as he looks to crack the music industry, telling Vogue: “The more I do it [the music], the better it gets. I would have denied myself some of the other great things about this place”.
Max Verstappen split the Mercedes, but eventually wound up fourth quickest, whilst team-mate Daniel Ricciardo could only manage P11, behind McLaren’s Fernando Alonso.
“It’s such a special number for me and my family”, said Hamilton, who thanked his mechanics.
Rosberg, who won the first four races in succession, is now without a win in two since his victory at Sochi, in Russian Federation, on May 1, but has dismissed all talk of pressure as he attempts to wrest supremacy from his team-mate.
Hamilton, a victor here on four occasions – including his debut victory back in 2007 – was comfortably quickest in the morning before ending the afternoon session on top again.
This year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed will take place from 23-26 June, having taken place every year since 1993.
Ricciardo refused to say he was in the fight for the title, but you would be very foolish to discount him now and the mere spectre of another challenging the domination of Mercedes is very exciting indeed.
The German was leapfrogged on the time-sheets in the second session by countryman Sebastian Vettel, the four times champion, who was second fastest in a Ferrari that has a new turbocharger for this race. “I need to understand that”, he said.
As the rain fell on the tight and twisty streets, stripping away circumstances and leaving the drivers to feel their way through a 78-lap race in the most challenging conditions imaginable, it felt as though normal service was finally resumed at Mercedes during the Monaco Grand Prix.
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“Everyone highlighted the second pit stop, which was effectively where we lost the race, but I questioned the first pit stop as well”, he said.
