It was appropriate unheralded Sebastian Vettel stood at the top of the standings after first practice.

Valencia on Friday unveiled its showcase track that snakes its way for 5.440km around the Spanish's city port and marina.

It may bear the name Valencia Street Circuit, but it is far from a street course when you think of a venue as prestigious and historic as Monaco.

The Principality uses ordinary public roads that are closed off for the few days Formula One is in town.

In contrast, Valencia's circuit is predominantly purpose built, with wide run-off areas to catch any mistakes, and there were many as the drivers acclimatised themselves to the virgin territory.

Nevertheless, it is still remarkably eye-catching, notably crossing a swing bridge that when in every day use opens and closes to allow yachts and ships to enter and exit.

At one point, the fastest section where cars hit speeds of 315kph, there is the unusual sight of seeing them heading in one direction, whilst the other side of a large concrete barrier there is a dual carriageway with ordinary road vehicles travelling in the other.

So on a hot day, with temperatures hitting 29 degrees centigrade at 10am, it was left to Toro Rosso's Vettel to make a name for himself.

In the dying moments of the 90-minute session, the young German knocked Felipe Massa off top spot, setting a fastest time of one minute 40.496 seconds.

In preparations the teams had anticipated a lap time of one minute 37 seconds, so Vettel's best was around 3.5secs beyond the target.

It would be fair to assume Vettel was running a low-fuel option late on, along with team-mate Sebastien Bourdais as the Frenchman finished fourth.

Sprinkled amongst the Toro Rosso duo were a host a familiar names as Massa was second and McLaren's Lewis Hamilton third, 0.326secs down on Vettel, with the current championship leader spinning late on.

After Bourdais came Hamilton's team-mate Heikki Kovalainen, fresh from his maiden win in Hungary just under three weeks ago, with BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica sixth, followed by reigning world champion Kimi Raikkonen in his Ferrari.

The top 10 was completed by Williams duo Kazuki Nakajima and Nico Rosberg who sandwiched the ninth-placed Fernando Alonso in his Renault.

Alonso's team-mate Nelson Piquet completed the most laps with 32, but was still down in 15th, whilst it was a difficult morning for Jenson Button and David Coulthard.

The two Britons struggled to get to grips with the track and were down in 17th and 19th respectively for Honda and Red Bull, 1.964 and 2.816secs off of Vettel's pace.

Remarkably, Mark Webber brought up the rear in his Red Bull, just over three seconds down.