It is normal that the third drivers finish Friday quicker than the race drivers because they have more sets of tyres available to them and the race cars tend to run reduced revs to save wear on the engines which, this year, have to last two grands prix before they can be changed. But, Zonta apart, Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher also figured strongly in Friday’s top 10 at the Circuit de Catalunya.

The fastest time of the day (1m15.062s) came from West McLaren Mercedes third driver Pedro de la Rosa, with Zonta stopping the clock in 1m16.220s. McLaren has its injured driver, Juan Pablo Montoya, back in Barcelona but, just as De la Rosa set his fastest time in the final seconds of the second session, the Colombian was involved in a heavy accident, although he walked away apparently uninjured.

Zonta said: “It was a good day although I lost time in the first session with a hydraulic problem which stopped me from completing my programme. The second session was strong though, and I managed to finish my tyre comparison.”

Trulli (1m16.653s) finished the session with fifth fastest time and added: “The track was quite slippery early on and we did very few laps in the first session, but as the rubber went down the car was generating more and more grip and felt very good. I am confident that we can have a better race here in Barcelona than we did at Imola.”

Ralf Schumacher, meanwhile, lapped in 1m17.264s, the ninth fastest time of the day.

“It was a typical Friday,” he explained. “I was concentrating on general set-up and the car felt reasonably good. I found more grip throughout the second session through the changes we made but we are going to have to look carefully at tyre choice here.”

Behind De la Rosa and Zonta, Nick Heidfeld (1m16.527s) was third quickest for the BMW Williams F1 Team, Kimi Raikkonen (1m16.586s) was fourth for McLaren Mercedes and David Coulthard (1m16.797s) completed the top six for Red Bull Racing.

Panasonic Toyota Racing Technical Director, Chassis, Mike Gascoyne was satisfied with the overall level of performance.

“The second session was very good and the cars look competitive,” he said. “Tyre choice is going to be interesting and doesn’t look that clear cut, but the car looked pretty quick and consistent on both types of tyre so, all in all, a pretty pleasing day. After a difficult Imola weekend we look much more on the pace here in Barcelona.”

Gascoyne confirmed that since Imola the TF105s have been fitted with aerodynamic updates that produced good results in the wind tunnel and have performed similarly well on the circuit.