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Thursday, 1st November 2007

Filippi maintains strong close-season testing form as he prepares for an all-out assault on 2008 series honours.

Luca Filippi led the way on day two of testing at Paul Ricard, leaping to the top of the timesheets after swapping from DPR to 2006 championship-winning outfit ART Grand Prix.

The Italian – who finished third in the final standings this year with Super Nova – was the only driver of the 26 present to dip below the 1min 13secs barrier all day long, succeeding in doing so in both the morning and afternoon sessions. Indeed, the series sophomore only narrowly missed out on beating Andreas Zuber's best lap from day one, despite Wednesday's running being disrupted by light, intermittent rain and punctuated by a number of red flags.

Zuber was again right at the sharp end of proceedings whatever the team, the Austrian switching across from Minardi Piquet Sports to Campos Grand Prix for the first time and lapping third-fastest in the morning session and second in the afternoon, two tenths shy of the pace-setter.

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Sébastien Buemi took the third-quickest time overall for Arden International, with Andy Soucek continuing to demonstrate DPR's upturn in form with fourth in both sessions. Vitaly Petrov made it a good day for Campos by winding up fifth, ahead of top rookie Davide Valsecchi, a consistently impressive top ten challenger all day long.

Adrian Valles (FMS International), Oliver Jarvis (DPR), Pastor Maldonado (iSport International) – who had shone in the morning session with the second-best time – and DAMS' Mikhail Aleshin completed the top ten.

Meanwhile, after finally displaying his much-vaunted potential with the fifth-quickest lap in the morning, Kamui Kobayashi blotted his copybook with a spin into the barriers in the afternoon, taking out the left front suspension of his DAMS machine and relegating the Japanese ace to the bottom of the standings.


Morning times – 31/10/07:

1. Luca Filippi ART Grand Prix 1m 12.986s
2. Pastor Maldonado iSport International 1m 13.071s
3. Andreas Zuber Campos Grand Prix 1m 13.359s
4. Andy Soucek DPR 1m 13.573s
5. Kamui Kobayashi DAMS 1m 13.610s
6. Sebastien Buemi Arden International 1m 13.767s
7. Adrian Valles FMS International 1m 13.827s
8. Ben Hanley Campos Grand Prix 1m 13.848s
9. Davide Valsecchi ART Grand Prix 1m 13.925s
10. Oliver Jarvis DPR 1m 14.046s
11. Jerome d'Ambrosio Arden International 1m 14.048s
12. Christian Bakkerud Super Nova International 1m 14.187s
13. Markus Niemela Racing Engineering 1m 14.364s
14. Matteo Puglisi Minardi Piquet Sports 1m 14.489s
15. Kasper Andersen FMS International 1m 14.591s
16. Michael Herck Trident Racing 1m 14.653s
17. Marcos Martinez Racing Engineering 1m 14.669s
18. Mikhail Aleshin DAMS 1m 14.714s
19. Alberto Valerio Trident Racing 1m 14.720s
20. Paolo Nocera BCN Competicion 1m 14.962s
21. Carlos Iaconelli Durango 1m 15.008s
22. Dani Clos BCN Competicion 1m 15.117s
23. Diego Nunes Minardi Piquet Sports 1m 15.122s
24. Celso Miguez Super Nova International 1m 15.586s
25. Vladimr Arabadzhiev Durango 1m 18.763s
26. Jonathan Kennard iSport International No time

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