Phoenix Audis lead Lausitz practice

The French driver and his team-mate Oliver Jarvis were at the top of the timesheets when the session was stopped with 11 minutes remaining after Johannes Seidlitz had a big crash towards the end of the lap.

The German rookie ran wide out of one of the final corners, and spun across the track as his right rear wheel touched a wet patch. His car speared into the barrier on the other side of the track, causing serious damage to the rear of his A4.

Officials decided that it would not be possible to restart the session, meaning that the majority of drivers would not have had a chance to simulate qualifying runs at the end.

Behind the 2008 Audis, reigning champion Timo Scheider was third quickest ahead of Jamie Green's one-year-old Mercedes, and Hockenheim race winner Tom Kristensen.

Mattias Ekstrom was sixth fastest for Audi, ahead of Paul di Resta in the top 2009 Mercedes.

The weather conditions at Lausitz prevented the session from offering an accurate form guide ahead of qualifying. The track was wet to begin with, and took a long time to dry.

The lap times fell significantly once it did, and drivers from both manufacturers were able to set the pace during the variable conditions.

Ralf Schumacher finished the session a long way adrift of the rest of the field, as he was forced to spend most of his morning in the pits with a problem, preventing him from running once conditions had improved.

Pos  Driver              Car       Time
 1.  Alexandre Premat    Audi      1m18.378s
 2.  Oliver Jarvis       Audi      1m18.575s  +  0.197s
 3.  Timo Scheider       Audi      1m18.588s  +  0.210s
 4.  Jamie Green         Mercedes  1m18.603s  +  0.225s
 5.  Tom Kristensen      Audi      1m18.676s  +  0.298s
 6.  Mattias Ekstrom     Audi      1m18.763s  +  0.385s
 7.  Paul di Resta       Mercedes  1m18.786s  +  0.408s
 8.  Martin Tomczyk      Audi      1m18.803s  +  0.425s
 9.  Maro Engel          Mercedes  1m18.805s  +  0.427s
10.  Mike Rockenfeller   Audi      1m18.853s  +  0.475s
11.  Bruno Spengler      Mercedes  1m18.922s  +  0.544s
12.  Markus Winkelhock   Audi      1m19.112s  +  0.734s
13.  Mathias Lauda       Mercedes  1m19.137s  +  0.759s
14.  Katherine Legge     Audi      1m19.220s  +  0.842s
15.  Gary Paffett        Mercedes  1m19.417s  +  1.039s
16.  Susie Stoddart      Mercedes  1m19.456s  +  1.078s
17.  Christian Bakkerud  Audi      1m20.094s  +  1.716s
18.  Tomas Kostka        Audi      1m20.467s  +  2.089s
19.  Johannes Seidlitz   Audi      1m21.172s  +  2.794s
20.  Ralf Schumacher     Mercedes  1m31.547s  + 13.169s