Practice 4: Arrows run, Fisichella shunts

The Arrows duo left the pitlane together just nine minutes from the end of the session. They completed a single installation lap each, then parked their A23s back in the garage. Having officially participated in practice, they should be able to take part in qualifying later on this afternoon.

The session was stopped for over half an hour following Fisichella's frightening shunt 15 minutes into the practice. The Italian was negotiating the long, fast Estoril right-hander when his Jordan's front wing broke. Fisichella was on the exit of the corner, riding a kerb when it folded back underneath the nose of his EJ12.

He had no chance to control the car from that point and it ploughed head first into a thick tyre wall on the outside of the circuit. Despite the heavy impact, Fisichella emerged unhurt.

Michael Schumacher remained at the top of the times despite failing to improve on his benchmark set in the earlier session. The German suffered his second spin of the weekend when he lost the back end of his car on the way into the Adelaide hairpin.

McLaren ace Kimi Raikkonen came the closest to knocking Schumacher off the top with a time just 0.02s slower than the Ferrari. His team-mate David Coulthard gave the Mercedes-powered team even more reason to be optimistic for qualifying by going third fastest at the expense of Rubens Barrichello. Like his Ferrari team-mate, the Brazilian did not improve on his first session time.

Jenson Button was an encouraging fifth for Renault, eclipsing the Williams-BMWs of Juan Pablo Montoya and Ralf Schumacher. The pair completed a lot of laps over the two 45-minute sessions, but appeared to be struggling to get anywhere near the ultimate pace. If Montoya is to take a fifth consecutive pole position, it looks like he will have to pull something pretty impressive out of the bag this afternoon.