Andrea Piccini and Jean-Denis Deletraz maintained their advanage in second free practice ahead of tomorrow's FIA GT finale in Dubai, as a surprise interloper came into play to spoil Aston Martin's party.

Piccini and Deletraz lapped more than a second quicker than their earlier best, reinforcing the pair's dominance as they bid to clinch second place in the GT1 end-of-year drivers' standings. Philipp Peter, Karl Wendlinger and Jarek Janis slipped back to third position in session two, albeit less than half a tenth slower than their pace-setting team-mates, as the Corvette C6R of Bert Longin, Anthony Kumpen and Mike Hezemans – eighth in the morning session – annexed second place just under four hundredths of a second shy of the top spot.

Champion pairing Michael Bartels and Andrea Bertolini, accompanied for the weekend by experienced Belgian ace Eric van de Poele, improved to fourth position in their Maserati MC12, with the Saleen of Sascha Bert, Andrea Montermini and Jos Menten fifth and Jamie Davies, Thomas Biagi and Vincent Vosse sixth in the sister Maserati.

The Larbre Competition Ferrari 550 Maranello, running in G2 with the new Care Racing Development customer engine, once again shone just over a second off the ultimate pace in seventh.

In GT2, Tim Mullen and Chris Niarchos continued to head the field, just squeezing into the top ten outright in their Scuderia Ecosse Ferrari 430 GT2, almost a second clear of Peter Kox and Peter Dumbreck in the Spyker Squadron Spyder and champion Jaime Melo and newcomer Toni Vilander in their AF Corse Ferrari.