Patronise F1

Nick Heidfeld emerged fastest of all, the German BMW driver taking advantage of the track drying towards the end of the session to grab a morale-bosting lead with a 1:47.876, ending almost three tenths of a second clear of the McLaren of Heikki Kovalainen.

As the session started, the conditions were already slightly damp, and as the intensity of the rain increased, the drivers hid away in the pit lane, deciding for some reason not to test in the wet despite the highly plausile potential for a wet qualifing session or race tomorrow.

Either way, it took 35 minutes before cars started appearing on dry weather tyres, and then the session went barmy, as almost the entire field poured out to get in some dry running. It looked as if Lewis Hamilton was set for the minor glory to the quickest time, but he was beaten in the closing stages by Heikki and then Ickle, with Alonso leaping into 3rd place to leave the championship leader 4th.

Felipe Massa ended just behind him, albeit only having done 6 laps, with Sebastian Vettel sixth for the ever-capable Toro Rosso outfit. Kimi Raikkonen ended seventh, with Nico Rosberg's Williams, Piquet Jr's Renault and Mark Webber's Red Bull completing the top ten.

Further down, there was despair for Robert Kubica again, who saw his team mate go fastest while he was mire in 13th, and struggles for Toyota, their cars ending 11th and 15th. Meanwhile, the second drivers at the caffiene conglomerates struggled, as David Coulthard ended 12th and Sebastien Bourdais finished 14th.

The woes continued as well for Honda, the team's weekend now beginning to resemble a Greek tragedy. Barrichello was slowest of all the drivers for the session, while his team mate Jenson Button didn't even manage to set a lap, his car griding to a halt on his first lap. It really has become beyond a joke.

Another mad practice session then, but with qualifying coming up, the question seems to be whether anyone has found a strategy in amongst all the rain. Either way, live commentary on the qualifying session will begin on this site at 12:30 BST.