Raikkonen Fastest in Practice 4 - Turkey

Raikkonen, who won the last race and will go out last in qualifying, set a time of 1:26.120 to finish almost half a second clear of second-placed Jenson Button, who continued his strong form with BAR-Honda.

After cloudy skies gave way to clear blue and sunshine, raising temperatures to 29 degrees Celsius, Raikkonen proved he will be the man to beat when the heat turns up at the Istanbul Park circuit.

Championship leader Fernando Alonso, who has a 26-point advantage over his rival, displayed the potential of his Renault when he posted the third fastest time but he was half a second slower than his rival.

Juan Pablo Montoya finished fourth fastest in the second McLaren with Giancarlo Fisichella fifth in the second Renault and Takuma Sato sixth in the second BAR-Honda, making it a three-team lock-out in the top six.

Mark Webber put his Williams in seventh place with Ralf Schumacher shining for Toyota in eighth and David Coulthard, of Red Bull, and Felipe Massa, of Sauber, completing the top ten.

Montoya led the way for much of the session but Button went top with ten minutes to go then Raikkonen moved ahead by three tenths with three minutes left to run then went even faster with seconds to go.

Michael Schumacher once again pushed the limits and went off at turn eight and finished 14th fastest while both Barrichello and Trulli made mistakes at turn one and Christijan Albers went across the kerbs at turn three.

Webber was forced to return to the pits during one of his runs when he suffered a puncture, Massa went wide at turn 14, Raikkonen went off at turn eight and Christijan Albers spun his Minardi at turn 11.

Turn ten proved tricky for drivers at the end of the session and the corner caught out Fisichella, Montoya and Nick Heidfeld, of Williams, in the final 13 minutes of the session.

Pos Driver Team Time Laps 1. Raikkonen McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:26.120 10 2. Button BAR-Honda (M) 1:26.599 + 0.479 15 3. Alonso Renault (M) 1:26.627 + 0.507 13 4. Montoya McLaren-Mercedes (M) 1:26.748 + 0.628 11 5. Fisichella Renault (M) 1:27.240 + 1.120 15 6. Sato BAR-Honda (M) 1:27.308 + 1.188 14 7. Webber Williams-BMW (M) 1:27.335 + 1.215 7 8. R.Schumacher Toyota (M) 1:27.556 + 1.436 13 9. Coulthard Red Bull-Cosworth (M) 1:27.796 + 1.676 14 10. Massa Sauber-Petronas (M) 1:27.829 + 1.709 8 11. Klien Red Bull-Cosworth (M) 1:27.919 + 1.799 14 12. Trulli Toyota (M) 1:27.921 + 1.801 15 13. Heidfeld Williams-BMW (M) 1:27.951 + 1.831 9 14. M.Schumacher Ferrari (B) 1:28.155 + 2.035 16 15. Villeneuve Sauber-Petronas (M) 1:28.534 + 2.414 12 16. Barrichello Ferrari (B) 1:28.615 + 2.495 12 17. Monteiro Jordan-Toyota (B) 1:28.830 + 2.710 15 18. Doornbos Minardi-Cosworth (B) 1:30.155 + 4.035 14 19. Albers Minardi-Cosworth (B) 1:30.999 + 4.879 13 20. Karthikeyan Jordan-Toyota (B) No Time 3 All timing unofficial