The Paul Ricard session has traditionally been the point - given that it is their sole opportunity to run outside of race weekends - at which the greatest gains are made by the teams as they get their heads around the latest generation of car and the tweaks made by series organisers at the start of the year. In 2005, ART made the gains that would take it and
Nico Rosberg on to a successful conclusion to the season, while, last year, it was iSport that made the biggest leap forward to challenge ART’s dominance.
This year, however, Paul Jackson's team again came out on top and will arrive at Magny-Cours confident that both it and Glock can maintain position as championship leader. Zuber, meanwhile, will be hoping that his run of bad luck, which has seen gearbox problems blight his season so far, will be but a distant memory.
As well as the usual suspects, however, a couple of familiar faces return to the series this weekend, determined to shake up the established order. FMS International and Racing Engineering will both feature 'new' drivers this weekend, although, bizarrely, neither will be those they ran during the Ricard test.
Three-time race winner Adam Carroll returns to the fray at FMSI, having replaced the lacklustre Antonio Pizzonia. Although already committed to the DTM touring car series, the Briton will be looking to return the Italian team to the top of the podium after former Super Nova team-mate Pantano took it into the winners' circle last season. Although no-one has officially confirmed the details of the deal, word is that Carroll will be in for the season, with no date clashes between GP2 and DTM.
![Timo Glock - iSport International [pic credit: GP2 Media]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/339363.jpg)
