Ferrari Remain on Top at Mugello - Day Three

Ferrari's Rubens Barrichello continued to lead the timesheets in testing at Mugello ahead of the Spanish Grand Prix.

Brazilian Barrichello set a best time of 1:21.188, over half a second faster than Ferrari test driver Luca Badoer, who ended up second fastest of the day with a time of 1:21.857. The two Ferrari drivers were followed by the McLarens of Kimi Raikkonen and Pedro de la Rosa.

Also on track were BAR and Toyota teammates as well as Nick Heidfeld for Sauber and Antonio Pizzonia for Jaguar. The latter was not able to run more than 41 laps despite the team hoping the rookie could rack up more mileage ahead of next week's race, where Pizzonia is up for evaluation by the team.

"Today, we managed to complete some valuable work with the Michelin tyres that we will use in Spain next week," Toyota's Olivier Panis stated, "and we also went through some aerodynamic parts checks. But after two good days of work, I must admit that we had problems today with some of the mechanical development parts we tried and had to go back to running with more standard specifications. These is the kind of incidents you sometimes have to face in testing though, and I look very much forward to the next race to show we are making good progress."

"I was working on a very similar programme to Olivier's today," added Panis's teammate, Cristiano da Matta. "We concentrated on checking the Michelin tyres performance and consistency and worked on different set-up items and control systems tuning. Just like my teammate, I had a bit of a mixed day and we were not as successful as we hoped with the mechanical elements we tested, but we certainly have a lot of information to work on. I will do my utmost to try and conclude this week's test on a high note tomorrow."

BAR, Jaguar and Toyota will wrap up the session tomorrow.

Today's times:

Pos Driver Team-Engine Time Laps 1. Barrichello Ferrari (B) 1:21.188 87 2. Badoer Ferrari (B) 1:21.857 81 3. Raikkonen McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:22.461 65 4. de la Rosa McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:22.870 53 5. Villeneuve BAR-Honda (B) 1:23.548 95 6. Panis Toyota (M) 1:23.616 48 7. da Matta Toyota (M) 1:23.848 67 8. Button BAR-Honda (B) 1:23.876 92 9. Heidfeld Sauber-Petronas (B) 1:23.971 92 10. Pizzonia Jaguar-Cosworth (M) 1:24.969 41 All Timing Unofficial

Visit Atlas F1's Testing Center for further information