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Kovalainen On Top at Barcelona - Day One

Heikki Kovalainen reaffirmed his position as the GP2 pre-season favourite, by stealing the fastest time of the day in the final moments of an ultra-competitive Barcelona test

A total of 17 cars set a time within one second of the Finn, who rebounded from a mid-day engine change to set the fastest lap. He was immediately followed by BCN's Ernesto Viso, and Hitech Piquet Sport's Nelson Piquet Jr, who was not the only namesake present, as father and three-time World Driving Champion Nelson Sr. attended his first GP2 test.

Racing Engineering continued their impressive testing form as Borja Garcia and Neel Jani shadowed each other's times to finish 4th and 5th while regular pace setter and #1 holder Scott Speed was out of the wars in his iSport International entry, putting himself 19th.

With Super Nova confirming the lineup of Giorgio Pantano and Adam Carroll, the first test outside Paul Ricard also featured the first test session with the full 2005 grid. The doubt surrounding their drives seemed to have little effect, as they clocked in at 8th and 10th fatest, with first blood in what will be a closely watched duel going to Carroll.

Bridgestone used the final pre-season test to run their hard compound tyres and the action continues tomorrow at the Catalunya track, before the series moves to Imola for its Championship debut.

GP2 testing at Barcelona - day 1:

Pos  Driver         Team                    Time
 1.  Kovalainen     Arden International     1:25.998
 2.  Viso           BCN Competicion         1:26.033 + 0.035
 3.  Piquet Jr      Hitech Piquet Sports    1:26.078 + 0.080
 4.  Garcia         Racing Engineering      1:26.186 + 0.188
 5.  Jani           Racing Engineering      1:26.220 + 0.222
 6.  Bruni          Coloni Motorsport       1:26.267 + 0.269
 7.  Lopez          Dams                    1:26.313 + 0.315
 8.  Carroll        Super Nova Int.         1:26.428 + 0.430
 9.  Premat         ART Grand Prix          1:26.540 + 0.542
10.  Pantano        Super Nova Int.         1:26.541 + 0.543
11.  Pla            DPR                     1:26.559 + 0.561
12.  Rosberg        ART Grand Prix          1:26.597 + 0.599
13.  Lapierre       Arden International     1:26.603 + 0.605
14.  Hernandez      Campos Racing           1:26.639 + 0.641
15.  Yoshimoto      BCN Competicion         1:26.740 + 0.742
16.  Piccione       Durango                 1:26.939 + 0.941
17.  Fauzy          Dams                    1:26.951 + 0.953
18.  Alvarez        Campos Racing           1:27.210 + 1.212
19.  Speed          iSport International    1:27.265 + 1.267
20.  Negrão         Hitech Piquet Sports    1:27.517 + 1.519
21.  Artam          iSport International    1:27.518 + 1.520
22.  Sharp          DPR                     1:27.581 + 1.583
23.  Monfardini     Durango                 1:27.637 + 1.639
24.  Lauda          Coloni Motorsport       1:29.247 + 3.249

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