Wednesday September 15th, 2004

Former World Champion Jacques Villeneuve finished at the bottom of the times on his return to Formula One after not having driven a modern Grand Prix car for 11 months.

The Canadian, wearing white unbranded overalls with his name, blood group and the Canadian flag on them, managed a total of 70 laps of the Silverstone circuit at the wheel of the Renault R24 car, on the second day of work for the team.

Villeneuve posted a best time of 1:18.779, which was slightly under a second slower than Spaniard Fernando Alonso in the other Renault.

The former Williams and BAR driver will join Sauber in November, probably after he has competed for Renault in the next three races following the departure of Italian Jarno Trulli, who is set to move to Toyota. Villeneuve will continue testing tomorrow.

Finland's Kimi Raikkonen, meanwhile, set a new unofficial track record with a time of 1:16.150, 1.5 seconds faster than what Jaguar's Mark Webber had managed in June. McLaren driver Raikkonen was almost a second faster than Takuma Sato, who joined the test today and worked alongside Jenson Button, fifth quickest.

Toyota continued with their preparations for the Chinese Grand Prix with both Olivier Panis and Ricardo Zonta, the Frenchman finishing ahead of the Brazilian. Williams drivers Marc Gene and Ralf Schumacher finished near the bottom of the times with their BMW-powered cars.

Schumacher, who returned to work on Tuesday following his injury, had gone fastest on the first day of work, but today he finished only ahead of Villeneuve.

"Today's session was not as successful as we'd hoped for," said Williams test team manager Tim Newton. "Following his installation lap, Ralf suffered a technical problem which forced him to sit out most of the morning while we tried to rectify the situation.

"We did, however, manage to get Ralf out in the afternoon during which time he completed some tyre tests. Meanwhile, Marc Gene spent the day also completing tyre evaluations with Michelin. Both drivers will return to the track tomorrow for the final day of the test."

Testing at Silverstone continues tomorrow.

Today's times:

Pos  Driver        Team-Engine         Tyres  Time     Laps
 1.  Raikkonen     McLaren-Mercedes     (M)  1:16.150   60
 2.  Sato          BAR-Honda            (M)  1:17.128   86
 3.  de la Rosa    McLaren-Mercedes     (M)  1:17.207   94
 4.  Panis         Toyota               (M)  1:17.269   94
 5.  Button        BAR-Honda            (M)  1:17.597  101
 6.  Zonta         Toyota               (M)  1:17.651  132
 7.  Gene          Williams-BMW         (M)  1:17.719   81
 8.  Alonso        Renault              (M)  1:17.794   37
 9.  R.Schumacher  Williams-BMW         (M)  1:18.383   37
10.  Villeneuve    Renault              (M)  1:18.779   70

All Timing Unofficial