Massa stays on top in Bahrain

Massa, who caused the final red flag of the day when he stopped on track with 20 minutes remaining, covered a total of 100 laps on his way to the top of the timesheet, the Brazilian finishing over half a second quicker than his nearest rival, Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren.

Massa was testing the new aero package tried for the first time by teammate Kimi Raikkonen yesterday. The Finn was third quickest on another strong day for Ferrari.

Hamilton, hindered by a hydraulic problem in the morning, covered 55 laps in the Mercedes-powered MP4-22, while teammate Pedro de la Rosa completed 52 and was fifth fastest.

World champion Fernando Alonso did not test today, and instead watched the action from the pitwall.

Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella was the busiest driver with 109 laps covered, as his team tried to make up for the lost time following Heikki Kovalainen's crash yesterday.

The Finn returned to action in the afternoon following yesterday's high-speed accident, which forced Renault's mechanics to work overnight to have the car ready for today.

Kovalainen was back on track around 2pm and managed 30 laps, although he had to drive the car fitted with an old bodywork after destroying the one the team planned to use in Australia.

BMW Sauber continued to suffer reliability problems with their F1.07, with Robert Kubica again stopping twice with mechanical problems.

The remaining red flags of the day were caused by Scot David Coulthard, who lost a fuel flap while on track, Toyota's Jarno Trulli, Honda's Jenson Button and de la Rosa, whose car came to a stop late in the day.

Trulli's teammate Ralf Schumacher was back behind the wheel after having to skip half of yesterday's session following a spin in which he hurt his back.

Tomorrow's session is the final day of testing before the season kicks off in Australia.

Today's times:

Pos  Driver        Team                    Time     Laps
 1.  Massa         Ferrari            (B)  1:30.640  100
 2.  Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes   (B)  1:31.178   55
 3.  Raikkonen     Ferrari            (B)  1:31.490   94
 4.  Fisichella    Renault            (B)  1:31.967  109
 5.  de la Rosa    McLaren-Mercedes   (B)  1:31.971   52
 6.  Kovalainen    Renault            (B)  1:32.068   30
 7.  Heidfeld      BMW Sauber         (B)  1:32.264   73
 8.  Button        Honda              (B)  1:32.293   73
 9.  Liuzzi        Toro Rosso-Ferrari (B)  1:32.359   47
10.  Kubica        BMW Sauber         (B)  1:32.648   54
11.  Barrichello   Honda              (B)  1:32.650   61
12.  Sato          Super Aguri-Honda  (B)  1:32.837  100
13.  R.Schumacher  Toyota             (B)  1:33.054   85
14.  Coulthard     Red Bull-Renault   (B)  1:33.146   52
15.  Webber        Red Bull-Renault   (B)  1:33.238   53
16.  Trulli        Toyota             (B)  1:33.384   33

All Timing Unofficial