Raikkonen Cautious Despite Promising Start

Finn Kimi Raikkonen refused to draw any conclusions from today's free practice sessions for the United States Grand Prix.

Both Raikkonen and teammate David Coulthard set the fourth and third times respectively to give their McLaren a head start over their rivals for second place in the Championship Williams, who finished further down the timesheets.

Raikkonen, however, played down the importance of today's times and revealed he was not satisfied with his car's handling.

"It was quite difficult in the beginning. The car was very difficult to drive, but we started to make progress," said Raikkonen. "Friday's always a bit of guessing. You never know what other teams are doing.

"Our tyre should be quite strong here, and we just need to work to incorporate that."

Scot Coulthard also failed to find the right balance for his car and finished the day nearly 1.5 seconds off the pace set by Ferrari's Michael Schumacher.

"You always find new challenges on this track and its not easy to find the right race set up as you have to consider a compromise between the full throttle part and the tricky in-field section," said Coulthard.

"Today we focused on set up for the race, but we haven't found the ideal balance yet. However our tyre evaluation programme was positive."