Happy Schumacher Stays Confident

World Champion Michael Schumacher is confident ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix despite failing to top the times in today's practice sessions.

Schumacher, who will wrap up his seventh world title if he wins for the 13th time in 14 races this season on Sunday, set the third best time behind McLaren's Kimi Raikkonen and BAR's Jenson Button.

German Schumacher had a scare when he lost the rear end of his car heading into the Stavelot corner and his wheels ran over the gravel before he was able to continue.

"It was a productive Friday practice session and we seemed to have plenty of time to work through our planned programme without having to hurry," said Schumacher. "In fact, the red flag in this afternoon's session actually gave us more time to work on our programme.

"I am quite happy with the balance of the car. Now we must finalise our decision regarding tyre choice and I am looking forward to the rest of the weekend with confidence."

Ferrari's Rubens Barrichello, the only man who can prevent Schumacher landing a seventh world title, was eighth quickest in the afternoon having been third fastest in the morning.

"It is good to be racing at Spa once again, as it is such a challenging track which is really enjoyable to drive. This circuit always requires a great deal of work to get the set-up compromise right to suit the mix of different types of corner.

"To be honest, I feel we still have some work to do in this respect and now we will be studying all the data, prior to making progress tomorrow morning."