Warm-Up: Ferrari top the time sheets

Jordan pairing Giancarlo Fisichella and Takuma Sato were consistently among the top six during the session, ending up an impressive third and fifth respectively. Sandwiched between them was fellow Honda-powered driver Olivier Panis' BAR, the Frenchman obviously keen to make an impression with his BAR future the subject of much speculation of late. The final Honda driver, Panis' team-mate Jacques Villeneuve languished down in 17th position.

Sauber's Nick Heidfeld completed the top six runners, while Williams, who won the German Grand Prix last season with Ralf Schumacher, seemed uninterested in challenging for the fastest times. Ralf Schumacher, who will start behind brother Michael on the front row of the grid, was eighth fastest, two places ahead of Juan-Pablo Montoya, who completed only eighth laps. The Williams drivers were clearly less than happy and both enjoyed off-track excursions during the session.

McLaren also failed to catch the eye, shunning the chance to grab some glory and going about their business to record the seventh and ninth fastest times with David Coulthard and Kimi Raikkonen.

Eddie Irvine finished 14th, over 1.5s off the pace, with Alan McNish in 19th, seemingly happy with the performance of his race car and focusing on ensuring that the spare car, should it be needed, will be ready.

Mark Webber was the slowest of the 19 runners, one less than the 20 who ran in qualifying after Minardi team-mate Alex Yoong registered his third DNQ of the season.