By RA106
December 7 2006

Continuing with the Bridgestone Potenza tyre evaluation Lewis Hamilton has his first taste of success. This ended Ferraris domination over the test and spirits are back up in the Mclaren garage. This shows that the woking based team are fitting into the Japanese rubber boots quite nicely.

Hamilton was a second up to Renaults new main man Giancarllo Fisichella. Hondas only star  as Button is off ill with cracked ribs, Rubens Barrichello takes 3rd place have they finally found more pace to challenge for the title? Williams driver Nico Rosberg rounded up his test in 4th place racking up williams miles to 105 laps.

 

Toyotas only Schumacher left out paces Felipe Massa to take a respectable 5th and for the first time in testing Massa fails to lead the session in 6th is this a sign of whats to come? Christian Klien makes another appearence for Honda taking a well earned 7th place making up for a mechanical problem following the morning session.

 

Mclarens very own Pedro De La Rosa finished in 8th but dont panic as he was running an Aerodynamic program while most front runners continued to work hard at tyre develpoment.

 

BMWS Saubers not so quick Nick finishes the day in 9th working on new dampers. Renaults new second driver Hekki Kovalainen rounds off the top ten. While Robert Kubica doesnt have a great present on his birthday and ends overall 11th.

 

 A suprising result as Luca Badoer finishes 12th and the struggling Red Bull team continue to struggle down in 13th and 16th with Webber as the lead driver. Super Aguris new hope finishes in 14th running the most laps out of anyone with 112. Speed takes 15th and Kobayashi making his debute into formula one rounds off the test session for toyota.

Offical test times from ITV

Testing times from Jerez (7 December)

1.  HAMILTON      McLaren     1m18.682s

2.  FISICHELLA    Renault     1m19.681s

3.  BARRICHELLO   Honda       1m19.789s

4.  ROSBERG       Williams    1m19.957s

5.  R SCHUMACHER  Toyota      1m20.019s

6.  MASSA         Ferrari     1m20.030s

7.  KLIEN         Honda       1m20.048s

8.  DE LA ROSA    McLaren     1m20.134s

9.  HEIDFELD      BMW         1m20.161s

10. KOVALAINEN    Renault     1m20.198s

11. KUBICA        BMW         1m20.461s

12. BADOER        Ferrari     1m20.553s

13. WEBBER        Red Bull    1m20.586s

14. DAVIDSON      Super Aguri 1m20.696s

15. SPEED         Toro Rosso  1m21.125s

16. COULTHARD     Red Bull    1m21.275s

17. KOBAYASHI     Toyota      1m21.294s