McLaren keeps it cautious

"The higher ambient temperature, which is predicted for tomorrow and Sunday, will certainly help our competitiveness," said team principal Ron Dennis. "Kimi's mistake at Stowe kept him out of the top group, but neither his nor David's seventh position should hamper their ability to qualify well tomorrow."

Coulthard had his trademark stoical grin in place as he answered journalists questions afterwards. "I'm reasonably happy as the times are pretty close at the top," he said. "I was a little bit too cautious in the first sector compared to this morning's practice, as I wasn't sure about the weather conditions.

"It was spitting with rain whilst they were recovering Rubens' car, but in the end the track was fairly dry and as a result I know there is more to come tomorrow. In Friday's qualifying the main thing is to ensure that your lap time is good enough to put you in the same group as your main competitors, so you will have roughly the same track conditions in Saturday's qualifying - which is when it really counts."

Raikkonen's lap didn't look particularly off the pace, all the more worrying given his time. "I have struggled a bit to get comfortable with the car today, so we will be looking at where we can make improvements before tomorrow. During my qualifying run I made a mistake at Stowe, which cost me a lot of time. However its tomorrow's session which is important, so we will wait and see what happens then."