WilliamsF1 even further down the times in France

For the BMW WilliamsF1 team the second Friday practice session at the Magny-Cours circuit would see both drivers close to the bottom of the times with Mark and Nick in sixteenth and seventeenth.

With McLaren's Pedro de la Rosa fastest in the morning Friday practice session with a time of 1m:14.778, the teams would start the second session for the French Grand Prix. The McLaren driver was again out early and his first lap was a 1m:16.991.

But for his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen his session, and his race weekend, would turn sour when he was to have an engine failure. This would force him to change his engine thereby losing ten places on the starting grid. Raikkonen was seen to stand at the rear of his car looking at the failed unit, realising that this had not helped his hopes for a good result in the race.

Second so far in the session was Red Bull's David Coulthard with a time of
1m:17.652. Button would set a time that would see him in second, a 1m:17.039.
Ferrari's Michael Schumacher was now in third with a time of 1m:17.233. de la
Rosa would improve his time to now be a 1m:16.501.

For Red Bull's Christian Klien his session would come to an end when he was to
crash into the barrier at the 180 corner. at the front Alonso would go fastest
with a 1m:15.969. He would improve on this time with a 1m:15.641. Fisichella would make it a Renault 1-2 moving into second while Montoya was now in third.

But the Renault pair would see the Ferraris of Michael Schumacher and Barrichello move into first and second. But Alonso and Fisichella would move into second and third. So with half the session run the top ten was top ten is Michael Schumacher, Alonso, Fisichella, Barrichello, Montoya, Coulthard, de la Rosa, Trulli, Button, and Panis. But Michael's time would see beaten by Montoya when the McLaren driver would set a time of 1m:15.129 to go fastest.

Sauber's Jacques Villeneuve was now in seventh with a time of time of 1m:16.430. But de la Rosa would improve his session time to take seventh from the Canadian with a time of 1m:16.419. After not having set a time in the morning session Toyota's Trulli would set a time of 1m:15.774 to put him in sixth. Ralf was now in the top ten with a time of 1:15.925, with ten minutes of the session remaining. Alonso was able to move into third with a time of 1m:15.242. His team-mate Fisichella would spin at the last chicane but was able to continue.

As the session wound down it would be Friday tester Pedro de la Rosa who would put in a very quick lap to move to the top of the times with a 1m:14.460. This would see a McLaren 1-2 at the front with Michael in third.

As for the BMW WilliamsF1 drivers they were down the order in sixteenth and seventeenth with Mark Webber leading team-mate Nick Heidfeld. This seems to be par for the course for the WilliamsF1 team appearing to prefer to work through their schedule of tyre selections and then looking for outright pace on the Saturday. For Toyota Olivier Panis was in sixth.