Button outpaces Ralf Schumacher in testing
( 2002-04-18 09:24 ) (7 )

Briton Jenson Button's excellent start to the season looked set to continue after the Renault driver set the fastest time of the day in testing at Silverstone on Wednesday.

Ralf Schumacher, currently second in the championship 14 points behind his brother and world champion Michael, was second quickest for Williams, more than three tenths of a second slower than Button, who also topped the times on Tuesday.

Button has scored points in three of the four races this season, he was fifth at Imola last weekend, and is fourth in the drivers championship.

Eddie Irvine continued to show his good pace at Silverstone with a third place in the times as Jaguar searches for performance improvements on the R3, with German Heinz-Harald Frentzen fourth for Arrows.

Frentzen's countryman Nick Heidfeld was fifth quickest for Sauber, ahead of the British American Racing (BAR) of Frenchman Olivier Panis.

The Jordan pair of Takuma Sato and Giancarlo Fisichella said their team, which has yet to score a point this season, had made "a small improvement" but were seventh and eighth fastest as they tested new suspension geometries.

"I feel today went well," said Japan's Sato. "But I did have a couple of problems in the afternoon which meant I was not able to complete the tyre test programme as planned."

Marc Gene had sufficiently recovered from his accident at Bridge corner on Tuesday to return to the track for Williams but could only manage the ninth fastest time.

Jacques Villeneuve struggled to perform in the second BAR and only managed to out-pace his team's British test driver Anthony Davidson and Minardi's Malaysian race driver Alex Yoong, who failed to qualify for the San Marino Grand Prix last weekend.

At Mugello, Italy, Ferrari took part in a rare test alongside their rivals McLaren and test driver Luca Badoer, driving the F2002, was outpaced by Finn Kimi Raikkonen.

Briton David Coulthard was third fastest in the second McLaren, with the Toyota pair of Mika Salo and Allan McNish fourth and fiftn, almost three seconds off the pace.