McLaren drivers not completely satisfied

Coulthard who qualified fourth, was fastest in the first free practice session, while Raikkonen was quickest in the second and also the 15-minute warm-up prior to final qualifying.

"It's hard with these one lap runs to be completely satisfied with your performance particularly in these hot conditions," said Coulthard. "I made no big mistakes but I understeered a little at Turn Nine and the corner onto the back straight, so I was a little bit slower with the acceleration than I expected. As a result we could have been quicker but probably not as fast as the Renaults.

"However we hope that their strategy will see them pit earlier than us, and I think we can have a good race tomorrow."

Raikkonen, although also not entirely happy with his lap, believes that the weekend could still swing back into the McLaren team's hands: "My lap today wasn't a disaster, but it wasn't brilliant either. I locked the rear of the car under braking at the hairpin, which lost me some time, but fortunately I kept the car on the circuit. We will see what happens tomorrow, as there is a different starting grid.

"As there is not a lot of testing time during a grand prix weekend anymore, we will see how everybody copes with the race distance and hopefully the people at the front are running on low fuel levels."