Formula One news

Championship rivals 1-2 in final practice

Michael Schumacher ended the final practice session at Shanghai just two tenths quicker than championship rival Fernando Alonso with a 1.40.193s. Jenson Button squeezed out a 1.40.590s in his Honda whilst the Toro Rossos of Vitantonio Liuzzi and Scott Speed managed to capitalise during the mad rush at the end for dry track to finish fourth and fifth quickest. Mark Webber of Williams was sixth and Christijan Albers an impressive seventh in the ever improving Spyker MF1 car.

Overnight rainfall created wet track conditions and also washed clear the rubber put down yesterday. This put pressure on the teams who were yet to properly carry out tyre evaluations having done little running during the Friday sessions. The cars started running on intermediate tyres and drivers struggled to get within 10 seconds of Friday's dry pace. Half-way through the session however the track was drying up and drivers and teams played an anxious waiting game to see who would go out first on dry tyres.

Ralf Schumacher was the first to brave it and struggled for grip as did Felipe Massa, Rubens Barrichello and Sakon Yamamoto, who all spun but not as badly as Kimi Raikkonen who explored the gravel trap. Only in the final five minutes was the track good for quicker times but lack of any substantial running could make for an exciting qualifying session.

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