Practice 1: Little Ant sets pace

Following a red flag delay to retrieve the detached front wing of Timo Glock's Jordan, which had come off when he ran wide over the kerbs at Turn 1, Davidson lapped his BAR-Honda in 1m15.756s, just over a tenth clear of Schumacher, who set his time very early in the session. It wasn't all good news for Davidson, however, as he was forced to pull off the track due to a mechanical failure near the end.

Kimi Raikkonen gave McLaren another boost by recording the third fastest time, but was over half a second off Davidson's pace. Toyota tester Ricardo Zonta was fourth fastest in the new TF104B, a tenth clear of the once more impressive Giancarlo Fisichella of Sauber.

Olivier Panis was sixth fastest, giving Toyota more reason to cheer, ahead of Rubens Barrichello (Ferrari), Jenson Button (BAR) and Juan Pablo Montoya (Williams). F1 returnee Antonio Pizzonia was just 0.05secs slower than his new Williams team-mate in 10th.

The Renaults of Fernando Alonso and Jarno Trulli were off the pace, down in 13th and 15th respectively. Takuma Sato was also well down, the Japanese BAR driver back in 16th.

Besides Glock's front wing drama, the young German was forced to end his session early when his Jordan broke down near the end of the session. Christian Klien also hit a kerb and removed some aerodynamic parts from his Jaguar, while Minardi's Zsolt Baumgartner spun at the hairpin.

Jaguar's Mark Webber failed to complete a flying lap after suffering mechanical problems.