After his earlier gearbox problems Juan Pablo was aiming to make up for the time he had lost. But by the end of the session he could only manage a time that was good enough for eighth some 1.7 seconds slower than the fastest car.

His session would see him spin off the track three times as he struggled to find a setup to his liking. But one could not doubt his commitment as Juan Pablo was the fastest driver through the Eau Rouge corner with a speed of 327 km/h.

For team-mate Ralf Schumacher he would improve on his earlier time finishing fifth. Ralf would comment on the day by saying: "I am very happy with my car. There is nothing, which could cause me any real problems. However, I think that there is still room for improvement on the set-up side and we have a couple of things to sort out before we can make our final tyre choice. I am not worried too much either by the kerbs in the Bus-Stop chicane."

Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya managed to cover a considerable total of forty seven laps.

For BMW's Dr Mario Theissen find the right setup at Spa is a difficult process with its combination of long straights and slower sections. He added: "Especially the old, fast section of the circuit should suit us. In general, it is still not easy to find the perfect set-up for the cars. The combination of long straights and winding passages makes work more difficult."

When questioned about the events of 2001 which would see Ralf left sitting on his jacks as the field left the grid for the formation lap Ralf added: "Such things happen. That's why I've got no bad memories of Spa."

At the top of the times it would be the McLaren pair of Kimi Raikkonen and David Coulthard. Both drivers were able to find a good setup while they were running with a lighter fuel load as the team was aiming at doing quick laps in to properly analyse its rubber choice after the problems encountered in Hungary on a hard compound.

David Coulthard said: "There have been Fridays this year when we have been fastest so let's wait and see what happens tomorrow. We were following a specific programme to evaluate the tyres and gained a lot of useful data."

Behind the McLaren's came the Ferrari's with Michael Schumacher third while this morning’s fastest man Rubens Barrichello found himself further back but that was due to a loss of time having spun his car and beached it in the gravel at Les Combes late in the session.

Ralf Schumacher finished in fifth, just ahead of Jenson Button and Pedro de la Rosa who along with Eddie Irvine is benefiting from better steering in his car after the team made improvements to the R3 after Hungary.

Juan-Pablo Montoya improved late to take eighth place, with Eddie Irvine confirmed some good early signs for Jaguar with ninth, ahead of Toyota’s Mika Salo, Allan McNish, Jarno Trulli, and Jacques Villeneuve.

The Jordan Hondas of Giancarlo Fisichella and Takuma Sato were fourteenth and fifteenth, with Sato suffering Honda’s second engine failure of the day.

Olivier Panis was sixteenth, ahead of Felipe Massa, Anthony Davidson who completed the most laps of any driver, Nick Heidfeld, and Mark Webber.