Practice 2: Kimi boosts McLaren

Raikkonen stole the top slot from Ferrari's Schumacher a third of the way through the session setting the quickest time of the weekend so far - a 1m18.655s - nearly three seconds quicker than last year's pole.

The star of the session however was Giancarlo Fisichella, who was second quickest in his Sauber-Petronas C23. But his quick lap just seconds from the end of the session will be scant consolation to the Italian who was forced to make an engine change after the first practice session. The Sauber driver will have to forfeit 10 places on the grid after Saturday's qualifying session.

David Coulthard consolidated the McLaren fight-back with the fourth quickest time ahead of BAR-Honda's Jenson Button. The Briton is sporting a new helmet design this weekend - gone is the Union flag design replaced instead by a cross of St George.

Ferrari's Rubens Barrichello, who dominated the first session, was only sixth quickest this time out, eight tenths off the pace of Raikkonen.

Also off the pace second time round were the Williams duo of Marc Gene and Juan Pablo Montoya - seventh and 11th respectively, Renault also failed to find its form with Jarno Trulli the quickest of the pair in eighth while Fernando Alonso was 12th.

Jordan's test driver Timo Glock had a lucky escape after losing his wheel coming out of Bridge. The German skipped across the gravel as his car followed the wayward wheel coming to a halt beneath the big television screen.

BAR-Honda's third driver Anthony Davidson also hit trouble early on in the session running wide and off track, the Briton failed to get moving again drawing a close to his session.