Friday March 7th, 2003

By Timothy Collings

The McLaren Mercedes-Benz duo of Kimi Raikkonen and David Coulthard delivered an early warning to their perennial Ferrari rivals on Friday morning, when they came out late in the session to top the times in opening practice for Sunday's season opening Australian Grand Prix.

On a morning of rising temperatures and bewildered faces, as the teams experimented with fuel loads in advance of first qualifying in the new radical structure of Formula One's weekend order, it may or may not have been significant, but at least it provided proof that the Anglo-German outfit are intent on serious business this year.

Raikkonen, the baby-faced assassin from Finland who is regarded as the coolest man in the paddock, clocked the best time of 1:26.509 to finish ahead of Briton Coulthard, who was four-tenths of a second slower around the dusty, slippery and unpredictable Albert Park circuit. Interestingly, Italian Jarno Trulli was third-fastest in his Renault after doing only seven laps in practice, following a decent data-collection session earlier in the day in the early morning test session enjoyed by only four teams.

Ferrari were fast again, as expected, but appeared to be carrying more fuel and their two drivers Rubens Barrichello and five-times Champion Michael Schumacher were fourth and sixth respectively, the German red baron having dominated proceedings for a long period before being outpaced in the closing stages by his Brazilian partner before the McLarens came out in faster trim to steal the best times.

Australian Mark Webber, in his Jaguar, was also among the quickest men and also made the best of having been on the track in the early part of the day. He finished up fifth, splitting the two Ferraris, after running only 13 laps compared to 21 by Barrichello and 25 by Schumacher.

The one hour session saw many cars sliding and spinning with a long list of men managing to recover their briefly out-of-control vehicles as they slithered beyond the limits, but the bad news department was dominated by the BAR-Honda team. Both of their cars appeared to suffer serious engine problems, Canadian Jacques Villeneuve climbing from his as flames licked around the cockpit early in the session and Jenson Button also departing early as his seemed to blow up, without quite the same drama.

Pos  Driver        Team                   Time                    Laps
 1.  Raikkonen     McLaren Mercedes  (M)  1:26.509  220.680 km/h  17  
 2.  Coulthard     McLaren Mercedes  (M)  1:26.988    +    0.479  23  
 3.  Trulli        Renault           (M)  1:27.286    +    0.777   7  
 4.  Barrichello   Ferrari           (B)  1:27.459    +    0.950  21  
 5.  Webber        Jaguar Cosworth   (M)  1:27.564    +    1.055  13  
 6.  M.Schumacher  Ferrari           (B)  1:27.666    +    1.157  25  
 7.  Alonso        Renault           (M)  1:27.671    +    1.162   8  
 8.  Heidfeld      Sauber Petronas   (B)  1:27.918    +    1.409  17  
 9.  Montoya       Williams BMW      (M)  1:27.929    +    1.420  12  
10.  R.Schumacher  Williams BMW      (M)  1:27.982    +    1.473  23  
11.  Pizzonia      Jaguar Cosworth   (M)  1:28.092    +    1.583  13  
12.  Frentzen      Sauber Petronas   (B)  1:28.207    +    1.698  19  
13.  Panis         Toyota            (M)  1:28.362    +    1.853  12  
14.  Button        BAR Honda         (B)  1:28.493    +    1.984  10  
15.  da Matta      Toyota            (M)  1:28.698    +    2.189  24  
16.  Fisichella    Jordan Ford       (B)  1:29.327    +    2.818   6  
17.  Firman        Jordan Ford       (B)  1:29.531    +    3.022  15  
18.  Verstappen    Minardi Cosworth  (B)  1:30.198    +    3.689  14  
19.  Wilson        Minardi Cosworth  (B)  1:30.606    +    4.097  16  
20.  Villeneuve    BAR Honda         (B)  1:31.529    +    5.020   5 

All Timing Unofficial

Published at 01:05:22 GMT

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