By Huw Alban
April 29 2002

The OrangeArrows team enjoyed a competitive 1st free practice this morning in Malaysia. Enrique Bernoldi was on top form, with only the two Ferrari's quicker than him for the majority of the session. Heinz-Harald Frentzen also did well, finishing an eventual seventh fastest. A good start by the team Minardi's Mark Webber was the first driver to take to the track this morning, ahead a long line of cars as the teams eagerly completed their installation laps.

In a very short space of time Webber becomes the first victim of the weekend, beaching his car in the gravel. As the yellow flags wave, Enrique Bernoldi sets the fastest time of the session a 1.41.247. McLaren's David Coulthard becomes the second victim of the day, pulling off the circuit with smoke billowing out of the back of his car - yellow flags out again.

Sauber showed their pace as the yellow flags waved with Nick Heidfeld moving up to 2nd spot behind Bernoldi, just 9/1000ths of a second slower.

Bernoldi's fastest lap time was eclipsed shortly after by a searing lap from Michael Schumacher, the German almost 2 seconds faster than the Brazilian. With half the session completed by now Rubens Barrichello slots behind his team mate, and Enrique improves slightly to keep hold of what is now third fastest. During his run he also set the fastest straight line speed at 292 km/h.

Shortly after Enrique loses his third spot to a hard charging Heidfeld who finally finds the balance and speed he needs. Meanwhile Heinz-Harald Frentzen is also having a good session, moving his A23 into 6th spot.

In the closing minutes, Jordan's Takuma Sato nabs 6th spot from Frentzen and Bernoldi's good run comes to an end with his A23 coasting to a halt on the grass.

All in all this has been a very strong session from the OrangeArrows team, with both cars streets ahead of their fellow Cosworth powered Jaguar cars. Of course we have no idea what the team were working on, but hopefully it is a good indication of the teams true performance relative to the rest of the grid. The second session starts in one hours time.