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The Mercedes driver, who will take over at the
top of the Formula One standings if he wins at Ferrari's home
track, lapped the fastest circuit on the calendar with a best
time of one minute 21.537 seconds.
Finnish team mate Valtteri Bottas made it a one-two for the
reigning champions on a cloudy morning session with the
occasional drop of rain with a time 0.435 seconds slower than
Hamilton.
Vettel, the four times world champion who is seven points clear
of Hamilton after 12 of 20 races, was third fastest in 1:22.652
with his Ferrari team mate Kimi Raikkonen fourth in 1:22.689.
The Red Bull pairing of Australian Daniel Ricciardo and Dutch
teenager Max Verstappen followed, with both facing grid
penalties for Sunday's race, ahead of Force India's Sergio Perez
and Esteban Ocon.
The latter pair can expect team orders restricting their ability
to race each other after twice coming together in Belgium.
In a surprising turn up for struggling McLaren, whose Honda
engine has been short of both performance and reliability,
Belgian Stoffel Vandoorne was ninth quickest.
The Ferrari fans will take heart that Mercedes also looked
strong in Belgian Grand Prix practice at Spa last weekend only
for Ferrari to then close the gap with Vettel on Hamilton's tail
throughout the race.
"I think going into this weekend we need to be fair and say that
the track layout suits Mercedes but the performance that we
showed last week gives us hope," Vettel told reporters on
Thursday.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin, editing by Amlan Chakraborty)
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