Welcome back to the sunny Circuit de Catalunya for the second instalment of Friday practice for this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix. In case you missed FP1, Mark Webber looked pretty dominant and finished the session over a second ahead of his Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel. But while it looks fairly certain that the RB7s still have edge on the rest of the pack, we have yet see the best of the newly updated McLarens and Ferraris.

In this session the drivers will use the soft tyres and that will result in quicker lap lap times than the morning when only the hards were available. We'll also see the evolution of track conditions as the the surface starts to offer more grip as rubber from the Pirelli tyres gets laid down.

If you have any questions or comments during the session feel free to send them our way by clicking on the link at the top of the page.

Chris says: "Whilst being a little bias for Mark Webber, I do feel that he will challenge Vettel as the season progresses. My crystal ball is rarely wrong. All in all, really enjoying this season with tyres and good old fashion driving skill playing a major role."

It's 22C air temperature out there and the track is now up to 32C, which should help the tyres.

The BBC is reporting that Narain Karthikeyan picked up a fine for speeding in the pit lane. Not the first time that has happened this season.

The session is underway and Timo Glock is the first man on track.

Half the cars have now joined the Virgin on track. Jaime Alguersuari is starting a flying lap in the Toro Rosso, which had an engine problem in FP1.

Kobayashi makes a mistake into turn six and runs a little wide. He gathers it up without a problem and continues on his way.

Massa clocks the fastest lap with a 1:27.056, he's 0.453 up on Heidfeld in second.

Alonso blows Massa's time out of the water with a 1:25.707. That's closer to what we were seeing this morning from Webber.

All the cars bar Lewis Hamilton's McLaren have been on track now.

Alonso improves again to a 1:25.445. All the times are being set on the hard tyres at the moment, so the drivers will probably unlock another second or so when they switch to the softs.

Force India say that 71% of the lap is spent on full throttle while Mercedes reckon its 58%. Make what you will of that...

Button has improved to second fastest with a 1:25.769.

Alonso returns to the pits after completing eight laps. He is currently fastest by 0.324 seconds from Button.

Hamilton is now on a fast lap after a few early laps running six seconds off the pace.... and he goes fastest with a 1:25.236 which is about 0.1 seconds off Webber's time in this morning.

James says: "I have seen several articles about the ban on using exhaust gasses to blow the diffuser being banned, but that it was lifted for this race without mention of when it will be enforced. Any ideas? Also any ideas on who this may benefit?"

The ban is actually on exhaust gasses being blown on the diffuser when the driver is not on the throttle. The teams have been working on engine mappings to create a constant flow to the diffuser and therefore more downforce more of the time. The FIA wants to limit that practise but is planning to talk to the technical working group - made up of representatives from the teams - before it makes a final decision. If it does go ahead with the ban then it will likely come in ahead of Canada, although that's not confirmed.

It will have an effect on all the top teams. Red Bull and Renault have apparently made more progress on that front than most, however.

Pastor Maldonado has gone fourth fastest, 0.738 seconds off Hamilton, but he is on the soft tyres.

Shreelin says: "If DRS can only be activated for the car from behind, is this not an unfair advantage. Why not just make it a manual gear box and reduce some of the ground effect from the floor ie. Standardised floors for each car."

Rakesh asks: "How many sets of tires are reserved for each driver for Free Practice? Can they conserve it by skipping FP and having extra sets of tires for qualifying and the race?"

Each driver has a maximum of 11 sets of dry-weather tyres for each event, although this amount can be increased by the FIA to allow teams an extra set of Prime compound tyres or development tyres for Friday practice. The teams have to hand back sets after each practice session, leaving them with just six sets of dry tyres for qualifying and the race - three Prime and three Option. They cannot use their practice tyres in qualifying or the race.

Just to confirm, Hamilton's time was on hard tyres, Maldonado is the only driver in the top five to use softs so far.

Neville says: "I remember Schumacher setting the fastest 'winter' Test time. How does that time compare to the current times? Surely pole will be in the 23s!"

Schumacher's winter time was actually a 1:21.268, but that was after three days of solid running when the track was nicely rubbered in. So yes, we can expect a much faster time for pole position.

Meanwhile, Vitaly Petrov sets a new fastest time with a 1:24.786, which is a little bit closer to the winter times and the fastest of the day so far. I'm just waiting to confirm which tyres he was using but I suspect it was softs.

Maldonado and Kovalainen come close to an accident as the Williams slows down towards the end of the lap and the Lotus comes through at full pelt.

Hannes asks: "If a car passes a car with DRS and the car that was passed moved in behind that car can he then use DRS on that same straight?"

Nope, it's only cars within a second of the car in front at the detection point (in this case just before the last corner) that can use it. So if you were the car in front (and you weren't within a second of another car) you cannot use it.

Button complains of a severe lack of rear grip from his hard tyres and ducks into the pits. Meanwhile, Vettel is preparing for a soft-tyre lap - expect a new fastest lap in a couple of minutes time...

Massa has a massive rear lock up into turn 10 and runs wide. He's still trundling around on the hard tyres.

Vettel is on a fast lap as promised... he goes fastest with a 1:22.826 and is going even quicker on his second lap. He's 1.540 up on the Renault of Heidfeld.

Vettel goes just under 0.1 seconds slower on his final lap after losing time in the chicane in the final sector.

Webber is responding with a fastest lap of his own on the soft tyres. And he goes even quicker than his team-mate with a 1:22.470. That's 0.356 up on his team-mate Vettel.

Vettel returns to the pits and so does Webber. I'd be willing to bet the contents of my wallet (not actually that much) that those will be the fastest times we see today.

Schumacher is now on soft tyres, as is Massa.

Schumacher makes a couple of minor mistakes in the first two corners but nothing compared to Massa who lost the rear end into turn five and ended up in the gravel. That's the second time we have seen him lose the rear end under braking today.

Rosberg improves to a 1:23.586.

Neel says: "DRS is not allowed on first two laps of race. Is it allowed on last lap. If yes it seems very unfortunate for the driver in front. He has no way to defend his position."

Another question on the DRS: "Can the leading car use the DRS to overtake backmakers?"

Yes.

Back to the action, Button has gone third fastest with a 1:23.188. That's 0.718 off Webber.

We're still waiting on a soft-tyre lap from Alonso and Hamilton.

Sutil is stood at the back of his garage and it looks as though his car has a pretty serious problem.

Ferrari confirms that "Felipe's car is OK so he can continue to run".

Hamilton is now out on the soft tyres, what can he deliver?

The answer is the second fastest time with a 1:22.509, just 0.039 off Webber. So Hamilton looks as though he's in the hunt this weekend. His middle sector was faster than both Red Bulls.

Hannes says: "With both the two previous race qualifyings, Michael's times were jeopardized because the team waited until the last minute to send him out for a quick lap, and if he then makes a mistake he does not have time to improve. Can Ross Brawn not see that it is a mistake?"

It's a good point but they've only been doing one lap in order to save tyres for the race, which the teams consider to be more important. Schumacher did pass comment on this yesterday and said he stuck by that strategy and it was up to him to deliver a better lap.

Vettel is now out with heavy fuel and the soft tyres he set his fast lap on. He's about 5.5 seconds off the pace but will be learning vital information for Sunday's race.

Alonso popped up to fifth with his soft-tyre lap, 1.098 off Webber.

Matias makes a good point: "So there was one lap from Hamilton faster than Vettel's, meaning you owe me the contents of your wallet!"

Several receipts and a few British pennies are in the post.

Reginald says: "Michael should call it a day.He has had his season and now its the turn of the young guns,viz Vettel,Hamilton,Rosberg,Di resta,Perez.Lets hope HE does the right thing and call it a day soon.We will always remember him for some of his scintillating drives in wet and dry conditions.These young drivers are much better than the ones He raced against."

An update on Lotus' progress from Mike Gascoyne: "Big step on the soft tyre for Heikki, much better but still stuggling to get a good balance with the new configuration, as we expected"

Alonso just got pretty badly blocked by Alguersuari. He vents his frustration by waving his hand at the Toro Rosso and ducking into the pits.

Sutil is back on track after that problem earlier in the session.

Track temperature is now up to 43C.

Hamilton is heading back out on the option tyres for what I expect will be a heavy fuel run.

Ferrari says: "Fernando came in, just few seconds after Felipe. Not a very good run on softs in terms of lap time."

Rich responds to Reginald: "In the past two seasons, Michael's performance alone is better than half the drivers. Why should he call it a day when he delivers results consistently better than half the drivers on the grid? This is just more whining from someone who cannot appreciate success and talent for what it is."

Rob adds: "I'd like to remind him that Schumacher drove against and beat the following drivers throughout his career: Alonso, Hakkinen, Senna, Raikkonen, Piquet Snr and indeed Button. To say that the drivers out there are now better than the ones he faced is an injustice to all the aforementioned drivers and their achievements but also a complete fabrication. I'd love to hear a proper justification for this assumption I've heard brandied around the place. F1 always has the best drivers in the world and that's it. World level of talent neither rises or falls."

19 cars are out on track at the moment. Vettel has completed about 10 laps on his soft tyres now.

Karthikeyan runs wide at turn four, bounces through the gravel and rejoins the track without any major damage.

Vettel has now completed a massive 35 laps in this session on both soft and hard tyres.

23 cars are now on track. Karthikeyan is the only man in the pits after his little adventure in the gravel.

A couple of close scrapes out there at the moment. No accidents, but slower cars seem unwilling to make way for faster ones at the moment.

Schumacher looks as though he is struggling for grip after he was passed by a Force India and now has a Renault all over his gearbox.

Webber and Vettel are back in the pits after decent runs on the soft tyres.

The session has now come to an end so the order at the top is Red Bull, McLaren, Red Bull, McLaren.

Webber, who won here last year, was fastest with a 1:22.470, but crucially Hamilton was just 0.039 seconds slower and ahead of championship leader Vettel. Button was 0.718 off Webber so has a bit of work to do to get in the mix for tomorrow's qualifying.

Thanks for joining us today for Friday practice. Make sure you keep checking the site for all the reaction from teams and drivers as well as the all-important qualifying session tomorrow.