Mixed Fortunes for BAR Drivers

British American Racing drivers Olivier Panis and Jacques Villeneuve experienced very different fortunes in Friday's practice for the Austrian Grand Prix.

While the veteran Frenchman got off to a promising start by setting the eighth fastest time with his Honda-powered car, Canadian Villeneuve endured a torrid day to finish the session only ahead of Australian Minardi driver Mark Webber.

Panis, who completed a massive 66 laps in the two hour-long sessions, was pleased with his work and praised the performance of his Bridgestone tyres.

"It may look like I'm pay-per-lap, which of course is not true," joked Panis. "66 laps is a great day's running and very positive for the team. I wanted to explore as many different options as possible and this obviously helped me to finish 8th today with a race set-up I'm very comfortable with so far.

"Bridgestone have provided a good tyre for this race so we're in a good position to start working towards qualifying now."

Villeneuve struggled with the lack of grip in the first session and decided to change the set-up of his 004 car, losing a lot of valuable track time that in the end proved vital. The 1997 World Champion was two seconds off the pace.

"Obviously 21st is not where I should be today but I didn't get enough running to improve the set-up," admitted Villeneuve. "I struggled with a lack of grip this morning so we changed a few things during the break which took a little longer than expected."