Kimi Raikkonen of McLaren continued his fine form of late with fastest lap (1:10.643s) in the final free practice session for Sunday's US Grand Prix. Team mate Juan Pablo Montoya finished eighth, a second down on Raikkonen.
Following the Michelin 'go slow' in the earlier session today, all cars opted to go for times, braving the banked corner that had caused so much worry after the accident involving Ralf Schumacher yesterday.
Raikkonen finished just ahead of the in-form Jenson Button, the Canadian GP surprise pole sitter guiding his BAR-Honda around the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 1:10.844s.
Renault also look like contenders here, with Fernando Alonso third on 1:10.920s, and Giancarlo Fisichella sixth (1:11.375s) despite a late 'off' through the gravel before the banked turn.
Ferrari again struggled to match the pace of the front runners. Michael Schumacher set a creditable fourth fastest time (1:11.203s) while Rubens Barrichello could only manage 10th, half a second behind his team leader.
Takuma Sato also drove well, the second BAR-Honda driver making fifth position, with the Toyota of Jarno Trulli in seventh.
Ricardo Zonta, standing in at Toyota for the injured Ralf Schumacher, set an excellent ninth fastest time, just three tenths of a second down on Trulli.
Disappointment again faced the Williams BMW duo, Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld almost two seconds off the pace in 14th and 15th places, while the Red Bull Racing cars of Christian Klien and David Coulthard looked desperately short of grip in 11th and 16th respectively.
Likewise the Saubers of Jacques Villeneuve (12th) and Felipe Massa (13th).
The last four places, as usual these days, were fought over by the Minardis of Cristijan Albers and Patrick Friesacher, and the Jordan-Toyotas of Tiago Monteiro and an increasingly wild Narain Karthikeyan.
Written: Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:26:34
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