So with a little under an hour remaining, here's how they stand.

1) Ros 2) Ham 3) Bot 4) Alo 5) Vet 6) Mas 7) Per 8) Kvy 9) Ver 10) Ric

11) Hul 12) But 13) Mal 14) Rai 15) Gut 16) Oco 17) Fon 18) Kob

No time: Ste, Mag

Britain's Will Stevens isn't quite getting value for money just yet after pay for his drive at Caterham. He's completed an installation lap but has done no more with 30 minutes of this session remaining. Caterham report that they have detected a "technical problem" on the car.

"It's coming out, it's coming out," says Felipe Massa. What's he talking about? Well a look on track shows bits of the Williams body work has become detached. In the pits, however, it looks like it's Valtteri Bottas's car that's come off worse.

He gets on to team radio as well. "Some bits of the car just fell off."

Felipe Massa reports that he needs to pit because some bodywork is loose on his car. It's worse for his Williams team-mate Valtteri Bottas who has lost a massive chunk of his sidepod and engine cover on the right-hand side of the car.

Nico Rosberg hits back with a time of 1:44.860, three tenths quicker than Lewis Hamilton's first proper effort. At this stage, Mercedes look comfortable at the front, as they have all season.

Image source, Williams

Williams F1:, external It's the last Friday of term, doesn't that mean we watch a film? Not here!

Allan McNish
BBC Radio 5 live analyst in Abu Dhabi

"This circuit does suit Lewis Hamilton. It's a stop-start nature, a bit like a kart circuit in the way you can attack the corners - that suits his racing style."

Lewis Hamilton goes quickest with a 1:45.141, eight tenths quicker than anything else we've seen today with over an hour of the session still to go.

Valtteri Bottas goes quickest with a 1:45.913, a tenth quicker than the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg. Daniil Kvyat is third in the Toro Rosso, with Fernando Alonso fourth in his final race weekend with Ferrari.

Williams F1:, external It's an important weekend with double points so the focus will mainly be on #FP2 & optimising the car in those conditions.

Pastor Maldonado gets the first time on the board, but to be honest, it is nothing to write home about.

Our title contenders Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg are out on track on soft tyres so expect a lap time from them shortly.

We're up to 10 teams and 20 drivers this weekend, following the return of Caterham. The team missed the races in the United States and Brazil, but are back racing, at least for this weekend, after raising £1.8m from crowd-funding.

F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone helped them out by waiving freight costs and chartering a plane for staff attending the race. And they received a cash-injection from Will Stevens, who paid around £500,000 for his driver as Andrew Benson mentioned earlier.

The idea of the team racing in Abu Dhabi, according to Finbarr O'Connell, the man now running the team, is to "showcase the team for potential buyers who wanted to see that Caterham could still be a functioning race team. Read more from him here.

It's early days at Yas Marina, so it's no surprise to hear Jenson Button reporting a lack of grip. No times have been set, but all 20 drivers have completed at least one installation lap, to check all is well with the cars following their journeys over from Brazil.

Jenson Button: "Very low grip, there's very low grip".

Kevin Magnussen is using McLaren's new front wing all of today and according to Allan McNish, the team will make the decision as to whether they will use it for the rest of the weekend and thus fit it to Jenson Button's car.

McLaren have yet to announce their line-up for next season, although Fernando Alonso is expected to return to the team. That leaves one seat for either Magnussen and Button.

It's interesting that Magnussen is running the front wing in Abu Dhabi. Make of that what you will.

Allan McNish
BBC Radio 5 live analyst in Abu Dhabi

"If you take all of the season so far, Hamilton and Rosberg have been separated by an average of under a 10th of a second in a practice session."

We've got two driver changes in this session, with Formula Three champion Esteban Ocon getting a taste of the Lotus F1 car, with Romain Grosjean sitting out this session. Over at Sauber, Adderly Fong, who finished, er, 21st in GP2 last year, gets a shot in place of Adrian Sutil.

Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer in Abu Dhabi

Image source, Getty Images

"McLaren have a new front wing here that is the first fruits of the work of new chief engineer Peter Prodromou, who they hired earlier this year from Red Bull, where he was the right-hand man of design guru Adrian Newey. The wing bears a close resemblance to that on the Red Bull and it will be run in first practice by Kevin Magnussen.

"Nothing should be read into the choice of driver, with their second seat alongside Fernando Alonso next season still undecided; it's simply Magnussen's turn. If the wing works well - which it might not, having essentially been designed for a different car - they have enough to run on both cars for the rest of the weekend."

Image source, Mark Webber

Former F1 driver Mark Webber:, external Boys have a good weekend... A bit to be decided...

For the final time this year, first practice is go, go, go!