The opening Friday practice session for the 2012 British Grand Prix would get underway with rain falling at the Silverstone circuit. Pirelli had their hard and soft compound slick tyres on offer, with the addition of an experimental hard tyre for use in practice. But with the rain it would be the full wet weather tyre that would be the only option. For the Williams F1 team Valtteri Bottas would replace Bruno Senna for this session. Team-mate Pastor Maldonado would take to the track first followed shortly after by Valtteri.

With nearly half an hour completed it would be Webber fastest with a time of 2m:01.153, followed by Ricciardo and Vettel. But Ricciardo would lower the quickest time with a 1m:58.581. Neither of the Williams drivers had set a time and with half an hour remaining in the session Valtteri would be thirteenth with a time of 1m:59.733. Pastor was down in fifteenth with a 2m:00.125. Such were the conditions that the drivers were limiting their time of the track. Pastor had only complete d five laps and Valtteri seven.

As the session drew to a close the rain would continue to fall. Fastest with ten minutes remaining was Grosjean with a 1m:56.552, followed by Ricciardo,
Hamilton, Perez, Massa, Webber, Kobayashi, Schumacher, Rosberg, and Vergne in tenth. At the end of the session three drivers would not set a time including Alonso and Di Resta. Both Williams drivers would remain in their pits so their finishing positions remained unchanged.

Overall it was a session that would be meaningless in terms of the Williams team learning anything in regard to setup. It would now come down to whether or not the rain would stop for the next session.

Pos Driver         	Team		      Time      Laps
 1. Romain Grosjean     Lotus-Renault         1m56.552s 13
 2. Daniel Ricciardo    Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m56.827s 10
 3. Lewis Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes      1m57.174s 6
 4. Sergio Perez        Sauber-Ferrari        1m57.664s 11
 5. Felipe Massa        Ferrari               1m58.119s 7
 6. Mark Webber         Red Bull-Renault      1m58.463s 7
 7. Kamui Kobayashi     Sauber-Ferrari        1m58.483s 19
 8. Michael Schumacher  Mercedes              1m58.493s 10
 9. Nico Rosberg        Mercedes              1m58.942s 8
10. Jean-Eric Vergne    Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m59.076s 12
11. Sebastian Vettel    Red Bull-Renault      1m59.414s 11
12. Vitaly Petrov       Caterham-Renault      1m59.614s 9
13. Valtteri Bottas     Williams-Renault      1m59.733s 7
14. Heikki Kovalainen   Caterham-Renault      1m59.787s 10
15. Pastor Maldonado    Williams-Renault      2m00.125s 5
16. Kimi Raikkonen      Lotus-Renault         2m00.253s 6
17. Jenson Button       McLaren-Mercedes      2m01.834s 6
18. Timo Glock          Marussia-Cosworth     2m01.835s 6
19. Pedro de la Rosa    HRT-Cosworth          2m04.341s 9
20. Dani Clos           HRT-Cosworth          2m05.022s 11
21. Charles Pic         Marussia-Cosworth     2m11.760s 6
22. Fernando Alonso     Ferrari                         4
23. Paul di Resta       Force India-Mercedes            3
24. Jules Bianchi       Force India-Mercedes            1