CHAMPIONSHIP leader Lewis Hamilton lamented a lack of on-track action as both practice sessions for Sunday's Russian Grand Prix were thwarted by external factors.
A bizarre diesel spillage from a truck, which was sent out to sweep the track ahead of practice, wreaked havoc with the opening session before torrential rain scuppered any significant running later in the day.
Hamilton completed just 10 laps in the opening session which was delayed by 30 minutes as marshals desperately attempted to rectify the embarrassing spillage.
The Briton then spent the afternoon consigned to the back of the Mercedes garage as the persistent rain led to torrid driving conditions.
With dry weather forecast for the remainder of the weekend, Hamilton was among 12 drivers who did not bother to post a competitive lap in the rain.
Of those who took to the rain-soaked circuit, which runs through Sochi's Olympic Park, Williams driver Felipe Massa ended the session on top ahead of Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel with Massa's team-mate Valtteri Bottas third.
Earlier, Nico Hulkenberg headed the timesheets after the slippery surface, caused by the diesel spillage, began to dry out. Hamilton, who spun at turn 17 in the closing stages, was seventh fastest.
"From my point of view, there is not much to learn from today," the Briton, who holds a 48-point lead over team-mate Nico Rosberg with five races remaining, said.
"Today we had to just sit and wait, and hope that the rain stopped. I don't have any concerns about today as everyone is in the same boat so I hope that tomorrow and Sunday is better weather-wise. We feel confident about the weekend and we will find out more tomorrow."
Red-faced organisers of the race in Russia vowed to launch a probe into the truck spillage on Friday morning.
Track marshals and officials attempted to clean up the diesel by hosing down the affected areas with water, but it seemed to do little to aid the situation.
Vettel appeared to sum up the farcical mood, saying ''what a mess'' as he passed through the scene of the spillage in sectors two and three on intermediate tyres when the session eventually got under way.
Race promoter Sergey Vorobyev said: "All the practice sessions are running according to schedule, so the incident is not critical.
"There was a diesel spill and it took us some time to clean it - which caused the delay. There will be an investigation and it is an internal matter now."
Meanwhile, Formula One's chief executive Bernie Ecclestone downplayed Red Bull's threat to quit the sport.
Asked if there will be a full quota of teams on the grid in 2016, Ecclestone replied: "Yeah. For sure."
The 84-year-old, mobbed in the Sochi paddock ahead of Sunday's Russian Grand Prix, added: ''Everything's been sorted out so I wouldn't worry about it.''
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here