Vergne tops Snetterton test

Vergne was the only driver in the field to break the 72-second mark for a lap of the Norfolk circuit, and the Frenchman did it in two of the three sessions.

His best for the Carlin team was 1m01.935s, just four hundredths of a second shy of the Snetterton lap record set by Swede Marcus Ericsson in 2008. Hitech's Gabriel Dias was second fastest, seven-hundredths adrift.

The leading Mercedes runner was Daisuke Nakajima in seventh. His Raikkonen Robertson team spent much of the day concentrating on aerodynamic work rather than going for lap times. Nonetheless, the Japanese driver matched the time he set during testing at Snetterton in February.

Menasheh Idafar was the quicker of the two T-Sport National Class runners.

Pos  Driver                Team                 Car  Time       Gap
 1.  Jean-Eric Vergne      Carlin               D/V  1m01.935s
 2.  Gabriel Dias          Hitech               D/V  1m02.002s  + 0.067s
 3.  Will Buller           Hitech               D/V  1m02.007s  + 0.072s
 4.  Lucas Foresti         Carlin               D/V  1m02.047s  + 0.112s
 5.  James Calado          Carlin               D/V  1m02.089s  + 0.154s
 6.  Daniel McKenzie       Fortec               D/M  1m02.092s  + 0.157s
 7.  Daisuke Nakajima      Raikkonen Robertson  D/M  1m02.101s  + 0.166s
 8.  Rupert Svendsen-Cook  Carlin               D/V  1m02.113s  + 0.178s
 9.  Adriano Buzaid        Carlin               D/V  1m02.161s  + 0.226s
10.  Jazeman Jaafar        Carlin               D/V  1m02.201s  + 0.266s
11.  Oli Webb              Fortec               D/M  1m02.275s  + 0.340s
12.  Jay Bridger           Litespeed            D/M  1m02.391s  + 0.456s
13.  Alex Brundle          T-Sport              D/V  1m02.393s  + 0.458s
14.  Menasheh Idafar       T-Sport              D/H  1m02.443s  + 0.508s
15.  Hywel Lloyd           CF/Manor             D/M  1m02.505s  + 0.570s
16.  James Cole            T-Sport              D/H  1m02.602s  + 0.667s
17.  Carlos Huertas        Raikkonen Robertson  D/M  1m02.695s  + 0.760s
18.  Felipe Nasr           Raikkonen Robertson  D/M  1m02.700s  + 0.765s
19.  Max Snegirev          Fortec               D/M  1m02.797s  + 0.862s
20.  Adderley Fong         Sino Vision          D/M  1m03.648s  + 1.713s