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Red Bull star

Second practice at Silverstone saw Heikki Kovalainen take a comfortable top spot, the Finn in the McLaren the only man to break in to the 1:19 bracket with a time of 1:19.989.

Half a second back, second place man Mark Webber put his Red Bull ahead of Lewis Hamilton in the second McLaren, with David Coulthard slotting the second Red Bull into a fourth place that confirms the pace of the Renault-engined RB4 this weekend.

Nico Rosberg was faster of the Williams duo in fifth – team mate Kazuki Nakajima ninth after missing the latter part of the session following a collision with a wall – while Sebastian Vettel followed him closely in sixth for STR.

Surprise package of the session was the Honda RA108, with Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello showing in seventh and tenth, while eighth went to Felipe Mass in the hastily repaired Ferrari.

Clearly Ferrari were not gunning for outright pace this session, as Kimi Raikkonen figures in only 12th, sandwiched between the BMW pair of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld who also appeared not to be in too much of a hurry.

Toyota had a torrid time with Timo Glock losing most of the session to a mechanical problem and Jarno Trulli appearing to lose a rear wing that led to a visit to the barriers, while Renault failed to show the pace promised this morning s Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet mixed it time wise with the Force Indias and Sebastien Bourdais’ STR.

More to come, then, from both Ferrari and BMW tomorrow, although it has to be said that Kovalainen’s pace on extended stints looked very strong indeed.

Written: Fri, 04 Jul 2008 14:43:24