Nico Rosberg revelled in his return to home soil by topping the times in Friday’s second free practice for this weekend’s German Grand Prix.

The in-form German was fastest in the morning session by three-tenths of a second. And he again dominated in the second session, repeating the feat by four-tenths in the afternoon with a flawless demonstration of smooth precision on the technical Hockenheim track.

Just five days after losing the lead in this year’s drivers’ championship for the first time, it was a perfect ‘bounce-back’ by the 31-year-old Mercedes man.

Rosberg clocked a best lap of one minute and 15.614 seconds in the second session to outpace teammate Lewis Hamilton by 0.394 seconds.

The Mercedes men were ahead of four-time champion Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari.

Dutch teenager Max Verstappen was fourth ahead of his Red Bull team-mate Daniel Ricciardo and 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen in the second Ferrari.

Another German Nico Hulkenberg responded to being at home by taking seventh in his Mercedes-powered Force India ahead of 2009 champion Jenson Button of McLaren Honda.

Sergio Perez was ninth in the second Force India and two-time champion Fernando Alonso was 10th for McLaren.

Hamilton leads Rosberg by six points in the championship after completing a hat-trick of wins at last Sunday’s Hungarian Grand Prix.