Free Practice 1: Kimi crashes
Kimi Raikkonen may be grabbing the headlines off the track with today's announcement of his switch to McLaren for 2002, but the young Finn was also the centre of attention in the first of Friday's practice sessions, spectacularly crashing his Sauber with 30 minutes of the hour-long practice gone
Raikkonen lost control of his machine under braking heading into the first chicane. He snapped right, then left then went into a big spin. He narrowly missed Alex Yoong's already parked Minardi then slammed into the barriers. Luckily he walked away unhurt.
The first chicane caused all sorts of problems for many of the runners in the first session, with Giancarlo Fisichella, Eddie Irvine, Juan Pablo Montoya (twice), Rubens Barrichello and Ralf Schumacher all having to go down the escape road after outbraking and missing the apex of the corner.
Just after Raikkonen's car was taken away, Michael Schumacher set a quick lap, his black-nosed Ferrari lapping the 3.6-mile track in 1m25.725s. That wasn't bettered until, with just four minutes of the session remaining, David Coulthard popped up with a 1m25.592s in his McLaren. However, the Scot didn't stay at the top of the timesheets for very long - Schumacher fought back with a 25.524s two minutes later to finish the session fastest.
Third quickest was Schumacher's team mate Barrichello, with Nick Heidfeld's Sauber in fourth - a commendable result considering the German clattered his C20 into the barriers at the second of the Lesmos curves with 15 minutes of the session remaining.
The other Finn in the news, Mika Hakkinen, was fifth fastest in the second McLaren, but the big surprise of the day was seeing Benetton's Jenson Button post a time in the top six. The under-pressure Englishman was the fastest of the Michelin runners, seven tenths of a second slower than Schumacher's benchmark time.
Despite his crash Raikkonen was seventh fastest, followed by the highly fancied Williams of Ralf Schumacher. Jarno Trulli's Jordan and Pedro de la Rosa, the fastest of the Jaguars, rounded out the top 10.
Jos Verstappen's session was over shortly after it began, spinning his Arrows A20 at the Variante della Roggia chicane on his first flying lap. The Dutchman finished the session at the bottom of the times, with Grand Prix debutants Tomas Enge and Alex Yoong in 20th and 21st position. Yoong's session was curtailed when his Minardi stopped on the pit straight.
For full results click here.
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