De la Rosa Fastest in Practice 1

As Formula One got underway at Silverstone following the tragic events in London Thursday, it was business as usual on track when Spaniard De la Rosa, a regular Friday pace setter, put in a time of 1:19.205 to finish on top.

Toyota test driver Ricardo Zonta, of Brazil, was second best but he could only get to 0.934 seconds behind the McLaren tester, with home favourite Jenson Button the fastest race driver, 1.006 seconds off the pace in third.

Kimi Raikkonen finished fourth fastest, 1.206 seconds slower than his McLaren teammate as he bids to chase down a 24-point gap to championship-leading Renault driver Fernando Alonso.

But Alonso, along with teammate Giancarlo Fisichella and Toyota's Jarno Trulli, chose not to set a time in the morning session, which was run under cloudy skies in temperatures of 19 degrees.

Ralf Schumacher, in the second Toyota, finished fifth fastest with Juan Pablo Montoya sixth for McLaren, just ahead of Michael Schumacher, who finished seventh in the lead Ferrari.

World Champion Schumacher was involved in an incident when he ran into the back of Nick Heidfeld's car when the Williams driver braked at the entry of the pitlane. Schumacher, running behind, slid into the back of the Williams, but no major damaged was caused.

Takuma Sato finished eighth fastest to put both BAR cars in the top ten as they strive for a good result on home soil, while Rubens Barrichello, in the second Ferrari, finished ninth fastest.

Felipe Massa, of Sauber, completed the top ten runners while Williams' struggles continued as Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld finished in disappointing 15th and 16th places respectively.

De la Rosa and Zonta traded places at the top of the timesheets during the session with Raikkonen the fastest race driver in third place with 15 minutes left to run.

Patrick Friesacher went off track at Club corner in his Minardi and both Tiago Monteiro, of Jordan, and Mark Webber, of Williams, made mistakes and went off track at Chapel.

Pos  Driver        Team                  Time                  Laps
 1.  de la Rosa    McLaren-Mercedes  (M)  1:19.205               21
 2.  Zonta         Toyota            (M)  1:20.139  +    0.934   30
 3.  Button        BAR-Honda         (M)  1:20.211  +    1.006   10
 4.  Raikkonen     McLaren-Mercedes  (M)  1:20.411  +    1.206    9
 5.  R.Schumacher  Toyota            (M)  1:21.080  +    1.875    6
 6.  Montoya       McLaren-Mercedes  (M)  1:21.091  +    1.886    5
 7.  M.Schumacher  Ferrari           (B)  1:21.453  +    2.248    9
 8.  Sato          BAR-Honda         (M)  1:21.582  +    2.377   10
 9.  Barrichello   Ferrari           (B)  1:22.216  +    3.011    9
10.  Massa         Sauber-Petronas   (M)  1:22.350  +    3.145   11
11.  Coulthard     Red Bull-Cosworth (M)  1:22.403  +    3.198    8
12.  Klien         Red Bull-Cosworth (M)  1:22.456  +    3.251    8
13.  Liuzzi        Red Bull-Cosworth (M)  1:22.615  +    3.410   22
14.  Villeneuve    Sauber-Petronas   (M)  1:23.370  +    4.165    7
15.  Webber        Williams-BMW      (M)  1:23.394  +    4.189    8
16.  Heidfeld      Williams-BMW      (M)  1:24.321  +    5.116    9
17.  Karthikeyan   Jordan-Toyota     (B)  1:24.581  +    5.376   10
18.  Monteiro      Jordan-Toyota     (B)  1:25.488  +    6.283   17
19.  Doornbos      Jordan-Toyota     (B)  1:25.560  +    6.355   12
20.  Albers        Minardi-Cosworth  (B)  1:25.897  +    6.692   16
21.  Friesacher    Minardi-Cosworth  (B)  1:27.246  +    8.041    7
22.  Alonso        Renault           (M)  No Time                 2
23.  Fisichella    Renault           (M)  No Time                 2
24.  Trulli        Toyota            (M)  No Time                  

All timing unofficial