The GP2 Series continued to underline how open and competitive it could be this season, with two different names topping the timesheets as the testing circus moved on to Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya.
After two days at Paul Ricard late last week, the new Dallara GP2/08 continued its development in the hands of all 13 teams at the Spanish Grand Prix venue, and Kobayashi gave another hint as to the step forward it provides by taking a couple of tenths off Andreas Zuber's existing lap record.
The Japanese driver, who has yet to come alive in the GP2 Asia series, built on a couple of strong showings with DAMS in France to clock 1min 26.806secs in the afternoon session in Barcelona, beating Zuber's mark of 1min 27.024secs, set last season with iSport International.
The lap was also a full second inside the morning's best mark, set by Piquet Sports' Pastor Maldonado, and ensured that Kobayashi became the sixth session-topper in as many outings this pre-season.
Maldonado's morning effort, meanwhile, put him back on top of the standings for the first time since his Ricard times were scrubbed for running an illegal rear wing. The Venezuelan ended the session nearly a tenth clear of closest rival Bruno Senna after three hours of running, with another pre-season favourite, Luca Filippi squeezing into third ahead of the already impressive Kobayashi. Vitaly Petrov rounded out the top five - which featured five different teams - as the first 18 cars all lapped inside a second of the pace.
As usual, there were red flag interruptions, but no major incidents to report. Ricard pacesetters Javi Villa and Romain Grosjean were down in sixth and 25th respectively, while Ben Hanley, who made the series sit up and take notice on the opening day in France, settled in 16th.
![Kamui Kobayashi - DAMS [pic credit: GP2 Series]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/404021.jpg)
