The opening Friday practice for the 2011 Malaysian Grand Prix would get underway with the usual series of installation laps from the drivers. Both AT&T Williams drivers would come out early with Pastor Maldonado taking to the track first. The first time of the morning would be set by Force India's Nico Hulkenberg with a 1m:44.557. After the frustrations of Australia the HRT team would again have difficulties as Karthikeyan would have his engine expire at Turn three having just left the pits.

Heidfeld would complete his lap setting a 1m:42.285 while Pastor took to the track. He would set a 1m:45.332 on his first lap. Hulkenberg was now down to a 1m:41.547 while Heidfeld would improve with a 1m:40.823 to again be fastest. Liuzzi would come out in the second HRT and would set a 1m:50.839. Schumacher was also out on the track and would set a 1m:41.169 to be third behind Heidfeld and Hulkenberg.

Pastor would improve with a 1m:40.854, moving up to second with thirty minutes of the session complete. Heidfeld would tour back to the pits slowly with a problem with what looked like a brake problem. More drivers were out on the track with the likes of Alonso, Button, Massa, and Webber running. Schumacher would pit with a best time so far of 1m:40.881. Pastor would also pit having complete ten laps while at the front Alguersuari would move ahead of the Williams with a 1m:40.770 to be second.

Rosberg was now sixth, 1m:41.223, while Vettel was down in tenth. But Webber would set a new fastest time with a 1m:39.870 to be 0.655 ahead of Heidfeld. Rosberg and Schumacher were now fifth and sixth. For Williams Rubens Barrichello was now out on the track. Neither of the Ferrari's had seta time while Button was down in seventh with a 1m:40.927. Webber would improve with a 1m:39.448 to now be over a second faster than Heidfeld. Pastor was now fourth and back out on the track.

Hamilton was now second with a 1m:39.747 while Webber would continue to push setting a 1m:38.483. Both Ferrari's had pitted to make changes to their cars while Rosberg was now in fourth with a 1m:40.663. Pastor was now fifth while Rubens had set a time that would see him currently in eighth, 1m:40.892. Rubens would pit while Pastor continued to find time but would slow in the final sector to remain fifth.

With thirty minutes remaining it was Webber fastest from Hamilton, Heidfeld, Rosberg, Pastor, Alguersuari, Schumacher, Rubens, Button, and Hulkenberg in tenth. Pastor would set a time of 1m:40.443 to now be third after completing nineteen laps on the harder tyre. Webber was back out on the track while Ricciardo would set a 1m:41.134 to be eleventh. He would improve to move up to tenth with a 1m:41.064. Pastor would pit but Rubens would continue to run. Massa and Petrov had yet to set a time while Alonso was down in nineteenth with a 1m:42.828. Hamilton would return to the track with twenty minutes remaining.

Petrov would finally take to the track after the Renault team fixed and issue with his car. But he would have a failure of the front left wheel that would see him into the gravel at Turn nine. Pastor had returned to the track while Rubens would find some pace moving up to fifth with a 1m:40.581. He would pit after this improvement. But despite this he was still over 2.098 seconds behind Webber.

Webber had pitted again while Kobayashi was now ninth, 1m:40.926. Petrov's Renault would be craned away while Massa would take to the track having yet to set a time. Ten minutes remaining and Webber was back out while Alonso would improve to be fifth with a 1M:40.601. Massa's first lap would see him set a 1m:40.675 to be ninth. Rubens had also returned to the track while Hamilton would pit still in second. Team-mate Button was down in twelfth, 1m:40.927.

Webber would set a new benchmark with a 1m:37.651 to now be 1.665 seconds ahead of Hamilton and 2.7 seconds ahead of third placed Pastor. With seven minutes remaining the track was very busy as Hulkenberg moved up to fourth with a 1m:40.448. Rubens had dropped to sixth as a result. Massa was now fifth, 1m:40.453, seeing Rubens drop to seventh with under five minutes remaining. Schumacher and Rosberg were down in ninth and tenth.

Rubens would run wide at Turn thirteen but would return to the track to continue his lap. Sutil was up to tenth with a 1m:40.734. Hulkenberg would move up to third with a 1m:40.377 but Schumacher would move ahead with a 1m:39.791. Heidfeld was now down in seventh while Rubens had dropped to eighth. Pastor was now fifth as the session drew to a close.

D'Ambrosio would end up in the gravel at the final corner after a failure with the front left wheel on his car. As a result the session would end under yellow flags with debris on the circuit. Vettel was down in seventeenth while Button was in fifteenth. Vettel was on a new set of hard tyres but had to back off as a result of the crash and chose to pit. So with the end of the session the order was Webber from Hamilton, Schumacher, Hulkenberg, Pastor, Massa, Heidfeld, Rubens, Alonso, and Rosberg in tenth.

Pos  Driver         Team		   Time       Laps
 1.  Webber         Red Bull-Renault       1m37.651s  22
 2.  Hamilton       McLaren-Mercedes       1m39.316s  16
 3.  Schumacher     Mercedes               1m39.791s  29
 4.  Hulkenberg     Force India-Mercedes   1m40.377s  23
 5.  Maldonado      Williams-Cosworth      1m40.443s  31
 6.  Massa          Ferrari                1m40.453s  22
 7.  Heidfeld       Renault                1m40.525s  6
 8.  Barrichello    Williams-Cosworth      1m40.581s  21
 9.  Alonso         Ferrari                1m40.601s  23
10.  Rosberg        Mercedes               1m40.646s  29
11.  Sutil          Force India-Mercedes   1m40.734s  21
12.  Ricciardo      Toro Rosso-Ferrari     1m40.748s  23
13.  Alguersuari    Toro Rosso-Ferrari     1m40.770s  24
14.  Kobayashi      Sauber-Ferrari         1m40.872s  27
15.  Button         McLaren-Mercedes       1m40.927s  16
16.  Trulli         Lotus-Renault          1m41.620s  21
17.  Vettel         Red Bull-Renault       1m41.627s  18
18.  Perez          Sauber-Ferrari         1m41.642s  24
19.  Glock          Virgin-Cosworth        1m42.154s  18
20.  d'Ambrosio     Virgin-Cosworth        1m42.540s  20
21.  Valsecchi      Lotus-Renault          1m44.054s  18
22.  Liuzzi         HRT-Cosworth           1m45.228s  20
23.  Karthikeyan    HRT-Cosworth           1m46.267s  10
24.  Petrov         Renault                1m47.932s  4