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Alexander Rossi was pleased with his performance for Team Lotus on his return to a Formula 1 cockpit for the first time in two years.

The American, a racewinner in Formula Renault 3.5 this year, lapped 5.366s off Jean-Eric Vergne's fastest time and is confident that he would have been closer but for a late-session red flag when he was running on super soft Pirellis.

"I am pleased," he told AUTOSPORT. "As a driver, you're always looking to maximise every tenth that is available and I think that we were missing a bit at the end.

"It was a session disrupted by the red flag, but everyone had the same thing to deal with. Our time leading up to that was quite good and we were expecting to pick up a sizeable chunk of time. But that's the way the dice roll sometimes.

"There is still time to find and I think I know where it is."

Rossi struggled a little with space in the cockpit of the Lotus but does not believe it harmed his performance.

He is taller than the team's regular drivers Heikki Kovalainen - whose car he drove - and Jarno Trulli, which made it harder to accommodate him in the car.

"It was tight and the team did a fantastic job of getting me in the car," he said. "If there was a bit more time, we would have made adjustments to make it a bit better. But being tall is something that I have to deal with.

"For long runs in the future, I would imagine that we'll have to make a few adjustments."

Rossi added that he had little trouble getting up to speed and was able to complete the programme that the team had planned for the day. This included work focused on its 2012 car.

"We got up to speed fairly quickly, which was quite positive," he said. "Then we started carrying out the test programme, which went very well.

"We were working on things for the 2012 car and finding a couple of new solutions, which was good for me to see."