McLaren's Lewis Hamilton has gone fastest in the first practice for this weekend's Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai.

He seems to have put the disappointment and controversy that has dogged the start of his title defence put behind him.

After winning the world championship last season, Hamilton has found himself in the headlines for all the wrong reasons this year following the 'lie-gate' scandal in the season opening race in Australia.

The 24-year-old was stripped of third place in that race and then finished seventh in Malaysia to register his only point of the season so far.

But, with his car sporting a revised diffuser design, Hamilton bounced back today to top the timesheet with a time of one minute 37.334 seconds.

Fellow Brit Jenson Button finished 0.116 secs behind Hamilton in his Brawn GP with a time of 1:37.450, while his team-mate Rubens Barrichello was third fastest at 1:37.566.

Heikki Kovalainen, who has yet to complete a lap on raceday this season, rounded off a good session for McLaren by finishing fourth with a time of 1:37.672.

Mark Webber of Red Bull was fifth fastest, while Toyota's Jarno Trulli continued his pleasing performances this season by finishing sixth.

There was disappointment once again for the Ferraris, however, as Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa could only finish 11th and 15th respectively, despite ditching the KERS energy-boosting system ahead of this weekend.

Following Wednesday's verdict by the FIA's International Court of Appeal that the controversial double-decker diffuser is legal, McLaren made their first tentative alterations to the car with Hamilton emerging from the pitlane sporting a new front wing and an interim diffuser.

He quickly put himself on top by going fastest in his 11th lap with a time of 1:37.603 before Button, looking to complete a hat-trick of wins this weekend, moved into P1 soon after as he shaved 0.450 off Hamilton's time.

But Hamilton found his form to reclaim top spot an hour into practice where he remained until the end of the session.