The Ferraris of Rubens Barrichello and Michael Schumacher headed the practice times in Zeltweb, Austria, after today's opening practice sessions while Tamuka Sato set the 10th fastest time in his DHL Jordan Honda. After a promising showing in opening practice, when he was 5th quickest, Giancarlo Fisichella had a problematic second session.
Fisichella was one of several drivers to fall foul of the very slippery conditions on the dry, dusty track, but both he and Sauber driver Nick Heidfeld spun off into the gravel traps early in the session and were unable to continue.
This meant that Fisichella's lap time from the morning remained his fastest time of the day, dropping him to a lowly 18th position whilst everyone else went quicker on the steadily improving track conditions.
"It was a good first session but then in the second I made a little mistake at Turn 1 and spun off. Everyone was struggling with grip today and it's easy to make a mistake. The new wing makes handling better and we will run with that. I have a lot of work to do in the morning."
Takuma Sato was initially unable to improve his lap time from this morning, the team trying several set-up changes and eventually, at the end of the session, improving by over a second to be 10th quickest.
"I am quite happy with today although we lost grip in the afternoon. It's difficult to get the right balance at this track, but we did some good back-to-back aero tests and I think the new wing is a positive step. We didn't do any runs on new tyres which most other teams did, so that probably had a reflection on our times."