Lewis Hamilton walks away from 130mph crash during practice in Bahrain

With just over nine minutes of the second practice session at the Sakhir circuit remaining, Hamilton slammed his McLaren sideways into a tyre wall.

The current world championship leader appeared to lose traction coming out of a series of swift turns, which led to him locking up and sliding across a run-off area into the barrier.

Several marshals behind the tyre wall ducked for cover as the 23-year-old impacted with considerable force.

After a few moments to compose himself, Hamilton emerged from his badly-damaged car before taking a look at the rear, suggesting that is where his problem lay.

The young Briton was then taken back to the McLaren garage on the back of a motorbike, while his car was craned onto the back of a truck and returned to the pits for repairs.

Fortunately Hamilton appeared unharmed, unlike at last year's European Grand Prix at the Nurburging when he ploughed nose first into a tyre wall in qualifying, suffering severely bruised ribs.

Hamilton still ended the session with the fourth-quickest time, albeit almost 1.5 seconds down on man of the day Felipe Massa.

Massa certainly appeared as if he was trying to prove his worth at Ferrari by posting the fastest time in both sessions.

Massa has come under fire of late following the opening two races in Australia and Malaysia from which he has emerged pointless.

Although an engine failure accounted for Massa in Melbourne, that was only after he had spun off the track at the first corner and was later involved in a shunt with Red Bull's David Coulthard.

Then 12 days ago in Sepang, the Brazilian suffered a loss of concentration that saw him spin out of the race whilst holding onto a comfortable second place.

Massa knows the pressure is mounting on his shoulders, and that he cannot afford similar mistakes this weekend at the Sakhir circuit.

He did not put a wheel wrong over the three practice hours, with his best lap time a one minute 31.240 seconds, a second quicker than his pole position lap of a year ago.

This is undoubtedly a track Massa loves as he was a pole-to-flag winner last season, and there is every prospect he could repeat the feat.

World champion team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was almost a second down, with Heikki Kovalainen third in his McLaren, just edging Hamilton into fourth.

Massa's pace was such that only the remaining six drivers in the top 10 were within two seconds.

BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica posted the fifth-best lap, followed by Nico Rosberg for Williams, David Coulthard in his Red Bull, the second Williams of Kazuki Nakajima, Toro Rosso's Sebastien Bourdais and the Renault of Nelson Piquet.

Jenson Button was 11th in his Honda, with Super Aguri's Anthony Davidson bringing up the rear over four seconds down.