The Hindu : Sport / Racing : Motor : Pedro de la Rosa dominates practice

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Apr 23, 2005

Sport

Sport - Racing : Motor

Pedro de la Rosa dominates practice

IMOLA (ITALY): Pedro de la Rosa gave his McLaren team a boost ahead of Sunday's San Marino Grand Prix when he finished comfortably ahead of his rivals in practice here on Friday.

De la Rosa, who raced for the team in Bahrain but returned to his usual third driver role this weekend, beat his session-leading lap in the first session with a time of 1:20.484 in the second to end the day on top of the pile.

Jenson Button signalled his and BAR-Honda's intent to return to the sharp end of Formula One this weekend when he finished second fastest.

The British driver, whose car has an improved engine and aerodynamics, finished with a time of 1:21.052, set early in the session, to split the McLaren drivers and leave Kimi Raikkonen, of Finland, third.

World champion Michael Schumacher finished right behind in sixth place with his Ferrari team-mate Rubens Barrichello seventh as the Italian team continued their fightback from a disappointing start to the year.

Alex Wurz, who is substituting for the injured Juan Pablo Montoya this weekend, put his McLaren in eighth place and Giancarlo Fisichella and Takuma Sato completed the top ten for Renault and BAR respectively.

India's Narain Karthikeyan, who clocked 1:23.842 seconds, finished 17th. The 28-year-old Jordan driver had described Imola as a ``highly technical'' circuit. Earlier in the first practice session, Kathikeyan finished 16th with a timing of 1:24.512.

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