Montagny goes quickest at Jerez

Indian Narain Karthikeyan, however, was the quickest of the V8 runners as he shone again at the wheel of the Williams, outpacing Australian Mark Webber in the second Cosworth-powered car.

Karthikeyan, in his second outing with Williams following last week's test, finished slightly over three tenths of a second behind Montagny, who drove this year's R25 car with a V10 engine simulating an eight-cylinder unit.

Karthikeyan, who looks like the favourite to land the third seat at Williams next season, outpaced Webber by nearly a second.

Webber, however, was hit by gearbox problems that hindered his progress.

"We need more time on the gearbox and on the engine," Webber told autosport.com. "In fact this test is slightly better than expected but we lost a bit of time with the transmission today and it was so cold in the afternoon, we
could not do any tyre programme. Hopefully we can develop more January."

Ferrari's Felipe Massa was third quickest in the Italian car, the Brazilian covering 68 laps at the wheel of the F2004 fitted with a regulated power version of the V10 engine. Massa worked on tyre development for Bridgestone.

Renault's Heikki Kovalainen, the busiest man on track today with 104 laps completed, was fifth fastest, ahead of Webber and the first of the Honda cars. The team rejoined the Jerez test today, working with both Anthony Davidson and Adam Carroll, who got back to F1 action for the first time since September.

Colombian Juan Pablo Montoya took over from Briton Gary Paffett at the wheel of the McLaren-Mercedes, as the British squad continued working on tyre testing and engine development. Montoya was eighth quickest, two places ahead of teammate Pedro de la Rosa.

Nick Heidfeld was again the only BMW driver on track, continuing with his tyre assessment programme and also working on cooling system checks.

The Toyota team had three drivers in action, all of them at the wheel of the new TF106. Brazilian Ricardo Zonta, who stopped on track twice during the day, was the quickest of the trio, while Olivier Panis and Frank Perera shared the second car, the veteran Grand Prix winner taking over from Perera in the afternoon.

The conditions in the afternoon, however, were poor and Panis could not complete much mileage. Zonta, meanwhile, had a productive day.

"I did some long runs, 12 laps or so in the morning, and the consistency improved," Zonta told autosport.com. "Graining is quite bad on the rear here but we have improved on that.

"We have found the direction so it is definitely better than last week. I could not complete the tyre programme in the afternoon, as it started raining and also lots of red flags."

Today's times:

Pos Driver        Team                Tyres  Time     Laps
1.  Montagny      Renault              (M)  1:18.804   97  *
2.  Karthikeyan   Williams-Cosworth    (B)  1:19.171   37
3.  Massa         Ferrari              (B)  1:19.264   68  *
4.  Zonta         Toyota               (B)  1:19.521   75
5.  Kovalainen    Renault              (M)  1:19.626  104  *
6.  Webber        Williams-Cosworth    (B)  1:20.105   46
7.  Davidson      Honda                (M)  1:20.133   93
8.  Montoya       McLaren-Mercedes     (M)  1:20.216   39
9.  Heidfeld      BMW-Sauber           (M)  1:20.325   75
10. de la Rosa    McLaren-Mercedes     (M)  1:20.885   84
11. Carroll       Honda                (M)  1:21.555   85
12. Perera        Toyota               (B)  1:21.556   18
13. Panis         Toyota               (B)  1:21.678   14      

(*) V10 engine

All Timing Unofficial