Ferrari's Felipe Massa set the pace with the quickest practice drive, while Narain Karthikeyan had a nightmarish outing in the practice sessions of the Indian Grand Prix, which made its debut at the newly-built Buddh International Circuit here today.

Massa emerged the quickest in the afternoon's practice session, toppling Red Bull's newly-crowned world champion Sebastian Vettel by 0.088 seconds. Massa's Ferrari team-mate Fernando Alonso emerged the third quickest.

While Massa stole the limelight on BIC's first outing, Force India drivers also gave home fans something to cheer about with Adrian Sutil emerging the seventh fastest, two places above teammate Paul di Resta.

However, it turned out to be a nightmarish outing for Karthikeyan who finished last in the 24th position after finishing two places above in the morning session.

Brazilian Massa was seventh in the morning's practice session with a timing of 1:28.644 but edged out Vettel in the afternoon when he clocked 1:25.706. Pace-setter Massa was impressed with the track layout although it was still dusty.

“It's a nice track, different. The last corner makes the entry wide which creates different directions for the race.

“You need to brake more in the middle of the corner and it's a good idea for overtaking,” he said. “The car was good, competitive. The track was dirty and it's difficult since there is a lot of sand outside the lane,” he added. Vettel finished second fastest in both the sessions but was a bit slow in the afternoon (1:27.416) compared to his morning drill when he managed 1:25.794.

Sutil was eighth in the first session (1:28.705) but improved his timing in the afternoon (1:27.316) to get to the seventh place, two places above team mate Paul di Resta (1:27853).

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