George Russell headed Lewis Hamilton in a Mercedes 1-2 in opening practice for the Dutch Grand Prix, as home hero Max Verstappen ground to a halt with a suspected transmission issue.

Mercedes’ pace was a statement of intent, as Russell clocked a 1m 12.455s to finished 0.240s clear of Hamilton around the 4km Zandvoort track, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz a further tenth of a second back in third.

Championship leader Verstappen, who triumphed on home soil last year, set the fastest lap on the hard tyres, but then slowed dramatically before eventually stopping the car.

His Red Bull team mate Sergio Perez had a challenging session, including running wide at Turn 9 and narrowly avoiding the wall before rejoining. He was seventh quickest overall.

McLaren had a strong showing, with Lando Norris fourth quickest, within half a second of the quickest time, with his team mate Daniel Ricciardo around 0.1s behind in fifth.

Charles Leclerc was a quarter of a second behind Ferrari team mate Sainz in sixth, with Alpine duo Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon eighth and ninth respectively, albeit more than a second off the pace.

Alex Albon completed the top 10 for Williams, his team mate Nicholas Latifi a full second back as the Canadian propped up the timesheets.

Mick Schumacher was 11th for Haas, ahead of the leading Aston Martin of Lance Stroll and the second Haas of Kevin Magnussen with AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly 14th.

Sebastian Vettel ran some large aerodynamic rakes for much of the early part of the session and ultimately ended up 15th, with Zhou Guanyu 16th and Yuki Tsunoda 17th.

Valtteri Bottas was 18th, with Verstappen – who only ran the hard tyres because of his stoppage – 19th.

Second practice gets under way at 1600 local time.