> Kubica fastest on slicks at Jerez

Robert Kubica put BMW on top of the Jerez timesheet for the second time in three days as he used slick tyres to set the best lap time on Thursday.

The Polish driver was running on the 2009-spec rubber when he completed a best effort of 1m19.157s, to outpace the groove-tyred Lewis Hamilton by under two tenths of a second.

It was the first time Kubica had driven an F1 car on slicks and he combined an evaluation of these with continued work on the 2008 electronics systems.

Ferrari had the luxury of calling on seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher for the second time this winter, but the retired legend couldn’t repeat his headline-grabbing performance from Barcelona.

It was his former team-mate Felipe Massa who finished highest up the order in third, with Schumacher half a second back in eighth after trying out the slicks.

Red Bull Racing’s Mark Webber ended the day fourth on the times despite losing track time due to an engine change.

The Australian finished just ahead of Toyota new boy Timo Glock and the second McLaren of Pedro de la Rosa.

Renault, whose fate in ‘Spygate II’ was being decided in Paris, completed its on-track programme for the week with Nelson Piquet Jr seventh.

Honda’s Rubens Barrichello was ninth, with Nick Heidfeld rounding up the top 10 for BMW.

At the bottom of the order was two of the candidates for a seat at Force India, with Tonio Liuzzi outpacing Ralf Schumacher.

However the latter was 0.7s adrift at the bottom after his first day in the F8-VII was interrupted by a hydraulics issue on his first run and a crash later on.

Testing times from Jerez (December 6)

1. KUBICA BMW 1m19.157s

2. HAMILTON McLaren 1m19.331s

3. MASSA Ferrari 1m19.333s

4. WEBBER Red Bull 1m19.605s

5. GLOCK Toyota 1m19.687s

6. DE LA ROSA McLaren 1m19.787s

7. PIQUET JR Renault 1m19.834s

8. M SCHUMACHER Ferrari 1m19.885s

9. BARRICHELLO Honda 1m19.905s

10. HEIDFELD BMW 1m20.125s

11. ROSBERG Williams 1m20.301s

12. VETTEL Toro Rosso 1m20.339s

13. BOURDAIS Toro Rosso 1m20.507s

14. TRULLI Toyota 1m20.775s

15. NAKAJIMA Williams 1m20.802s

16. FILIPPI Honda 1m20.915s

17. COULTHARD Red Bull 1m21.055s

18. SATO Super Aguri 1m21.093s

19. LIUZZI Force India 1m21.194s

20. R SCHUMACHER Force India 1m21.853s

Source: itv-f1