The penultimate day of 2008 pre-season testing concluded with the McLaren MP4-23s of Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen leading the way. But, as ever, today's times must be taken with a grain of salt, as differing programmes have caused relatively large gaps to appear throughout the field. For once, however, the weather remained predictable, with a dry day, albeit slightly cloudy in the morning, resulting in heavy running by most teams.

McLaren-Mercedes
Lewis and Heikki were on-track today again, as they continued with their preparations for the season-opening Grand Prix in Australia next month. Although their times of 1m21.234s and 1m21.434s were faster than last year's fastest race lap here, the team spent the day varying the fuel-loads in the car, in order to properly assess the car's performance under such conditions. It's therefore likely that the two drivers clocked their fastest lap on low fuel-loads and new tyres. Although their afternoon's work was completed trouble-free, their morning's work of pit-stop practice and qualifying simulations were disrupted slightly when fuel coupling issues stopped both cars on-track within minutes of each other. The problems were fixed promptly, however, and both drivers return here tomorrow morning.

Drivers: Lewis Hamilton (1st, 1:21.234, 82 laps), Heikki Kovalainen (2nd, 1:21.434, 71 laps).

Ferrari
Felipe Massa joined team-mate Kimi Räikkönen on-track for the second day, as they continued with the development of the F2008. While both Kimi and Felipe worked on preparations for the imminent start of the season, Massa also conducted a race simulation, with the pair clocking the third and fifth quickest times. Both the Finn and the Brazilian will be back on-track tomorrow.

Drivers: Kimi Räikkönen (3rd, 1:21.722, 72 laps), Felipe Massa (5th, 1:22.513, 102 laps).

Williams-Toyota
Splitting the Ferraris in fourth place was Germany's Nico Rosberg, as Williams continued to appear towards the sharp end of the timesheets. Although team-mate Nakajima's time was over six tenths off Nico's pace, that can be put down to the fact that the Japanese driver ran a race simulation in the afternoon, when the track was at its quickest. Both drivers also worked on set-up.

Dickie Stanford (Test Team Manager): “Nico Rosberg once again concentrated on set-up work all day today ready for Australia. Kazuki in the second FW30 also did some set-up work in the morning followed by a race run which he successfully completed in the afternoon. Both drivers will return tomorrow for the final day of winter testing.”

Drivers: Nico Rosberg (4th, 1:22.309, 75 laps), Kazuki Nakajima (11th, 1:22.977, 100 laps).

Force India-Ferrari
After a successful track debut yesterday, the new Force India-Ferrari VJM01 jumped up the timesheets on its second day of running, with Giancarlo Fisichella, as expected, comfortably beating team-mate Sutil's time posted yesterday. Fisichella's 1m22.516s was good enough for sixth place today, and was half a second quicker than Sutil went yesterday. He was joined by Tonio Liuzzi, who continued in the second chassis, as the pair worked on set-up in the morning, followed by race and qualifying simulations in the afternoon. Over 190 trouble-free laps were completed throughout the day. Tomorrow sees Sutil return to the cockpit, joining Fisichella for the final day.

Giancarlo Fisichella: “It was a good day. We did over 100 laps and worked through all the schedule. I was struggling with the front locking at first, but then we understood what the problem was and made a change so the car was back to normal and at the end I was comfortable and confident and able to improve my lap times. I am happy with the new package, it is better with more downforce and has more stability, but we have still got something more for the first race so it looks quite encouraging.”

Tonio Liuzzi: “Today was a much better test and we achieved a lot of kilometres and had no issues with the car. It seems to be getting better and better as we felt yesterday. We seem to have made a step forward from last year's car and now we are tuning the little details. We did some long runs and short runs for both qualifying and race simulations and were pretty happy. We still have some work to do, but we are for sure going in a good direction. The engineers did a great job - it was a tough programme between myself and Giancarlo but we both had no issues reliability wise and were very competitive over the day.”

Mike Gascoyne (Chief Technical Officer): “Again a very productive day of testing. We had no major reliability issues and despite the numerous red flags, we were able to work through the whole programme, with both drivers doing set up work in the morning and then race distances in the afternoon with pit stop practice. That went very well on both cars, so it was overall a good day. Thanks very much to Tonio for his two days of testing, we have definitely made progress with the new package and are very pleased so far.”

Drivers: Giancarlo Fisichella (6th, 1:22.516, 102 laps), Vitantonio Liuzzi (10th, 1:22.942, 89 laps).

Red Bull-Renault
Over at Red Bull, Sebastian Vettel was the surprise face seen in the team's garage at the start of play this morning, as he stood in for David Coulthard who was forced to sit out today's session due to a neck injury. The Toro Rosso driver spent the morning familiarising himself to the RB4, before evaluating various set-ups. Despite it being his first day in the car, he managed to out-pace race driver Mark Webber comfortably, by almost a full second. Webber, who lost time to minor issues, spent the day evaluating some new development car parts, and finished the day third-to-last on the timesheets. If Coulthard is unable to return to the track tomorrow, its likely that Vettel will take to the cockpit once again, with his driving duties at Toro Rosso now over for the week.

Christian Horner (Team Principal): “Unfortunately David suffered a trapped nerve in his neck yesterday, so we took the precautionary measure of giving him a day to recover ahead of the final day of testing and this near to the start of the season. It was logical to use Sebastian Vettel to continue testing, evaluating various important pre-Melbourne developments. We're grateful to Toro Rosso for making him available to us today. All being well, David will be back in the car tomorrow morning.”

Drivers: Sebastian Vettel (7th, 1:22.558, 110 laps), Mark Webber (17th, 1:23.458, 58 laps).

BMW Sauber-BMW
Mechanical and aerodynamic set-up was the focus of the day at BMW, as Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica continued with their team's programme for the week. In the morning, Nick did a precautionary stop on the track when a warning light came on, although the problem was soon tracked to a minor technical issue which was solved on the spot. Along with their set-up work, Nick and Robert also worked on electronics and practice starts and pit-stops simulating race conditions. Both driver return here tomorrow for the final day.

Drivers: Robert Kubica (8th, 1:22.625, 96 laps), Nick Heidfeld (15th, 1:23.284, 77 laps).

Honda
Race driver Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello were in action for Honda today, as they worked through qualifying and race simulations, including live pit-stops. Unfortunately for the team however, their running was brought to a premature end with two different issues stopping both cars on their second stints. Having identified the cause of the problems, the team will be implementing the required fixes quickly. Test driver Alex Wurz replaces Rubens for the final day tomorrow.

Drivers: Jenson Button (9th, 1:22.659, 67 laps), Rubens Barrichello (14th, 1:23.159, 74 laps).

Toyota
Over at Toyota, Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock were busy gathering data on the team's new aero package, with both cars running with it for the first time. The drivers' day was spent on aero testing along with work on brakes and set-up, with both Jarno and Timo set to return tomorrow for the final day.

Jarno Trulli: “We have made good progress today. We made it through a lot of different set-up work and we had a strong long run in the afternoon. The car seems more suited to long runs than to a single flying lap at the moment. So we still have some work to do in order to get a qualifying lap because that is important for the race. But in general it was a positive day.”

Timo Glock: “After all the disruptions due to the weather it was good to get a full day of running at last. But it was a difficult day for me. We spent the day looking at set-up but with all the changes we struggled to make the most of the improved track conditions and the extra grip. So we will have to analyse why that is overnight and aim to make a step forward tomorrow.”

Pascal Vasselon (Senior General Manager Chassis): “Finally we had a full dry day during which we could work quite a lot and move forwards in our preparations for Melbourne. Now we have all the information to decide the aero configuration for race one. The new aerodynamics package we brought here is a clear step forward. Things went quite well with our race preparation for Jarno. We will dedicate tomorrow to refinement but basically we are very pleased with his pace today. Timo was running a different programme and we will have to review the set-up direction with him tomorrow to see how we can help him to progress.”

Drivers: Jarno Trulli (12th, 1:23.023, 98 laps), Timo Glock (19th, 1:23.561, 80 laps).

Renault
Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet were on duty at Renault today, working on the performance of the R28 as their main focus. Along with this, Fernando worked through an aero programme, while team-mate Nelson resumed the set-up work he had begun at the end of yesterday. Both drivers return tomorrow morning for the final day.

Fernando Alonso: “It was a good day, especially as it was dry for the whole day. We continued testing the latest parts and updates before Melbourne and it was a good time to check that everything is working well. We still need to find some performance in the car, but we have the potential and we just need to discover it. There is only one day of testing left, and we need to fully attack tomorrow to make the most of it.”

Nelson Piquet: “We did not complete as many laps as we would have liked, but it was still a productive day and we learnt some things in the morning and gathered some interesting data. As a rookie, time in the car is so valuable and every time I drive the car I feel more and more comfortable. For sure it would be nice to have some more time to prepare for the first race, but we have made the most of the time we had available. We are back to race simulations tomorrow, and if we have time we will try and do some long runs.”

Christian Silk (Chief Test Engineer): “Good circuit conditions today, so we could get on with our programmes. We had some interesting stuff to try that had arrived from the factory and we got some good results from that. We also did some aerodynamic development and some chassis set-up work, which gave some positive results. So another good day's work, and we'll take that into tomorrow and continue with our preparations for the first race in Melbourne.”

Drivers: Fernando Alonso (13th, 1:23.112, 79 laps), Nelson Piquet jr. (18th, 1:23.467, 45 laps).

Toro Rosso-Ferrari
With Vettel on duty at parent team Red Bull, Sébastien Bourdais was drafted in this morning to conduct the team's full programme, after being initially scheduled to test only in the afternoon. The main focus of the day for Bourdais was to improve the mechanical grip of the car. Bourdais continues on-track tomorrow in the STR2B.

Driver: Sébastien Bourdais (16th, 1:23.323, 98 laps).

Tomorrow will be the final chance for teams to run before the start of the Australian Grand Prix weekend, with Friday practice due to take place on March 14th in Albert Park.

Unofficial times from Barcelona (26/02/2008):
1. Lewis Hamilton (McLaren-Mercedes) - 1:21.234, 82 laps
2. Heikki Kovalainen (McLaren-Mercedes) - 1:21.434, 71 laps
3. Kimi Räikkönen (Ferrari) - 1:21.722, 72 laps
4. Nico Rosberg (Williams-Toyota) - 1:22.309, 75 laps
5. Felipe Massa (Ferrari) - 1:22.513, 102 laps
6. Giancarlo Fisichella (Force India-Ferrari) - 1:22.516, 102 laps
7. Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull-Renault) - 1:22.558, 110 laps
8. Robert Kubica (BMW Sauber-BMW) - 1:22.625, 96 laps
9. Jenson Button (Honda) - 1:22.659, 67 laps
10. Vitantonio Liuzzi (Force India-Ferrari) - 1:22.942, 89 laps
11. Kazuki Nakajima (Williams-Toyota) - 1:22.977, 100 laps
12. Jarno Trulli (Toyota) - 1:23.023, 98 laps
13. Fernando Alonso (Renault) - 1:23.112, 79 laps
14. Rubens Barrichello (Honda) - 1:23.159, 74 laps
15. Nick Heidfeld (BMW Sauber-BMW) - 1:23.284, 77 laps
16. Sébastien Bourdais (Toro Rosso-Ferrari) - 1:23.323, 98 laps
17. Mark Webber (Red Bull-Renault) - 1:23.458, 58 laps
18. Nelson Piquet jr. (Renault) - 1:23.467, 45 laps
19. Timo Glock (Toyota) - 1:23.561, 80 laps