Practice 2 Report - Ferrari stays ahead

Felipe Massa set the pace for Ferrari on Friday afternoon with Kimi Raikkonen just behind him, but both Ferrari drivers were off in the course of the session, obviously pushing very hard on the unusual ly smooth surface of the Magny-Cours circuit. This is probably the best explanation for the speed of the Adrian Newey-designed Toro Rossos and Red Bulls, with Scott Speed third fastest, ahead of Lewis Hamilton's McLaren and the second Toro Rosso of Tonio Liuzzi. David Coulthard was sixth fastest. The only one of the four Red Bull who was not going well was Mark Webber, who retired with a transmission problem halfway through the session.

Nico Rosberg was seventh quickest in the Williams-Toyota, ahead of Fernando Alonso, who had two offs in the course of the session. Ninth fastest was Anthony Davidson in his Super Aguri-Honda with Ralf Schumacher 10th and Giancarlo Fisichella 11th for Renault.

The BMW team seemed a little out of sorts with Robert Kubica 12th and Nick Heidfeld 19th. Alexander Wurz was 13th with Jarno Trulli 14th and Jenson Button 15th.

Webber ended up 16th ahead of Heikki Kovalainen and Rubens Barrichello.

Nick Heidfeld was next but he is in trouble with his back and may even be replaced tomorrow by the team's test and reserve driver Sebastian Vettel.

Down at the back were Takuma Sato, Adrian Sutil and Christijan Albers.