De la Rosa topped practice times for McLaren in Shanghai

The Spaniard's best lap of one minute 32.834 seconds in the second session was narrowly faster than Toyota counterpart Ricardo Zonta.

Kimi Raikkonen was fastest of the race drivers in third, a second slower than de la Rosa.

Juan Pablo Montoya was fifth to make it three McLarens in the top five.

New world champion Fernando Alonso was pushing hard but made a mistake late in the session when he ran wide before recovering with a quick lap later for fourth.

Everything has been working well, and the car feels really strong Kimi Raikkonen

Alonso said: "The car was quite hard to drive today, but I think that is normal on the first day at this circuit when track conditions are so dirty."

Briton Jenson Button returned to action despite struggling with food poisoning to take eighth, while David Coulthard was 11th after spinning backwards across the grass.

"I was pretty ill yesterday," said Button. "It must've been a bit of food poisoning or something.

"I'm still on rice water and just plain water and that's about it so I'm feeling a little drained."

McLaren also set the pace in first practice when de la Rosa clocked the fastest time ahead of Ferrari's Rubens Barrichello and Ricardo Zonta.

Raikkonen said: "Everything has been working well, and the car feels really strong."

With Alonso having wrapped up the drivers' title attention is focused on the teams.

McLaren and Renault are battling for the constructors' title, with Renault going into the final race of the season two points ahead.