Summary

Jean Alesi was fastest man on the Barcelona (Spain) track today, during free practice. Jacques Villeneuve was second in the Williams.

Jordan was the team which seem to get it all right with Giancarlo Fisichella, being fastest in the morning, on a fourth spot and Ralf Schumacher third.

Notes

• Morbidelli spun off on the exit of the pitlane. He hits the wall on the other side of the track leaving the front of his Sauber damaged. He could walk away unhurt.
• Minardi were having problems with the clutch.
• Hill was penalised for doing too many laps. He will now only have 11 laps in qualifying instead of 12.
• Nakano will stay with Prost even though he is not likely to bring the team points because Mugen-Honda is demanding this says Prost.
  • Weather during session: Sunny

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22.

Alesi (Benetton) Villeneuve (Williams) R. Schumacher (Jordan) Fisichella (Jordan) Berger (Benetton) Coulthard (McLaren) M. Schumacher (Ferrari) Herbert (Sauber) Hakkinen (McLaren) Irvine (Ferrari) Panis (Prost) Frentzen (Williams) Magnussen (Stewart) Salo (Tyrrell) Katayama (Minardi) Nakano (Prost) Verstappen (Tyrrell) Barrichello (Stewart) Morbidelli (Sauber) Hill (Arrows) Diniz (Arrows) Trulli (Minardi) 107% rule

1m 19.566s 1m 19.766s 1m 20.198s 1m 20.537s 1m 20.933s 1m 21.312s 1m 21.319s 1m 21.379s 1m 21.421s 1m 21.423s 1m 21.636s 1m 21.887s 1m 22.839s 1m 22.849s 1m 22.892s 1m 23.191s 1m 23.209s 1m 23.246s 1m 23.451s 1m 23.592s 1m 25.049s 1m 25.064s 1m 25.136s

For fast session timing: F1 Timing

The Quotes

• Alesi: "We worked through a very good programme of testing last week here at this circuit and it has paid off. We did not have the same problems we had elsewhere and, if we can keep this up in qualifying on Saturday, I will be very confident for the race."

• Schumacher: "Today went pretty much as I expected. Some drivers tried new tyres in the last part of the session. I ran with little fuel and I thin the others might have been running with more. Realistically, I expect that we will be one to one and half seconds off pole tomorrow, but I don't know what our grid position will be compared to the other drivers."

• Berger:"We have had a lot of trouble with tyre temperatures and we seem to have overcome this today. But we shall have to wait and see if we are as competitive again in qualifying."

• Salo: "We made some good progress today and the handling of the car is now quite good. I did a long run at the end of the session and the tyres seemed to be OK. It is encouraging that we are not far off the pace and the midfield is again really close, so hopefully with the new engine we can go faster and qualify well."

• Morbidelli said after his crash: "I accelerated too hard and spun across the track into the wall opposite. It was my mistake."

• Irvine: "Track conditions are different to those at last week's test. My car is oversteering almost everywhere, which is probably down to the higher track temperature. I am still confident because the oversteer is consistent and should be easy to cure. Tomorrow my position might change as I did not use new tyres. In the race I will be aiming for one or two points as it will be difficult to get on the podium."

• Verstappen: "We had some difficulty getting the balance right on the car today. Although we made some changes which helped, I still have high-speed oversteer which makes it really difficult to get on the power out of the corners and put in a quick time. We need to improve for tomorrow's qualifying."