 Sunday Warm Up - Australian GP Saturday March 2nd, 2002 By Timothy Collings Heavy rain and several incidents ensured that Sunday's morning warm-up for the season-opening Australian Grand Prix was an exciting affair, even if it ended with the most predictable of conclusions: quadruple World Champion Michael Schumacher and his teammate Rubens Barrichello topping the times for Ferrari. Nothing, it seems, will stop the red Italian cars from dominating this race. Schumacher's only minor problem as he proceeded to complete 12 laps came when he stalled while making a practice start at the end of the pitlane. He also enjoyed an off-track excursion briefly, as did most drivers, on his way to a time that left him well clear of all rivals. If it is sunny, he is the quickest; if it rains, only Barrichello appears able to catch him. In this session, Schumacher clocked a best time of 1:41.509 to outpace Barrichello by 1.3 seconds at the front of the field. David Coulthard was third in the leading McLaren Mercedes - two seconds off Schumacher's pace, and Ralf Schumacher fourth in the Williams-BMW, ahead of Kimi Raikkonen in the second McLaren. Sauber's Brazilian debutant Felipe Massa, who qualified a fine ninth ahead of his German team mate Nick Heidfeld, cruised back to the pits early in the session but still managed to set the sixth fastest time. "It seems to be a software problem," said Sauber team manager Beat Zehnder. "There's nothing wrong with the car itself and we've already fixed it." Takuma Sato and the Jordan team suffered yet again when, just like on Saturday, the Japanese was left frustrated out on the circuit when his Honda-powered car came to a halt. "We don't know why, not yet anyway," said Eddie Jordan. Mika Salo, who had otherwise helped lead the new Toyota team through a near-faultless weekend, crashed in the closing minutes. Jaguar's Pedro de la Rosa was the slowest man on track, completing just three laps for the troubled Ford-owned team after a nightmare in qualifying. The list of those who made thrilling little excursions across the grass was long and predictable, too. But nothing was as predictable as seeing the 'red baron' on top of the time sheet again and, with the weather remaining unpredictable, he and his old 'F2001' Ferrari, on impressive rubber from Bridgestone, looks a strong favourite to complete his hat-trick of Melbourne triumphs.
Published at 23:03:55 GMT
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