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Jerez, day 3: Raikkonen sets pace

Kimi Raikkonen set the pace on the third day of testing at Jerez, McLaren's last at the Spanish track. The Finn took advantage of the warm afternoon conditions to set a best lap of 1m19.777s, giving him a half-second advantage over his nearest rival

After spending two frustrating days working with Cosworth's new 90 degree engine, Mark Webber switched back to the 2002 version and its greater reliability not only allowed him to cover 95 laps - the most of any driver at the test - but also to set the second best time.

In contrast, team-mate Antonio Pizzonia took his turn to try the new motor, but the Brazilian did just one installation lap and failed to set a representative time.

All of the four quickest runners set their best times during one lap 'qualifying' efforts. BAR tester Anthony Davidson was third fastest, narrowly quicker than his McLaren counterpart Alex Wurz, who had a busy day evaluating tyres.

Jenson Button had another day of familiarisation at BAR and the Englishman was again happy with how things went. The track was damp at the start of the session, which gave Button his first experience of Bridgestone's intermediate tyre and he was mightily impressed.

Sebastien Bourdais and Franck Montagny had a chance to impress at Renault and it was F3000 champion Bourdais who came out on top, recording a best lap more than half a second quicker than the Dallara Nissan front runner managed.

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