A strange day weather-wise at the Shanghai International Circuit, with fog and mist hanging over the impressive modern facility all day long. It was also an encouraging day for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro.

On the first day of track action for the final grand prix of the season, Rubens Barrichello, winner of last year’s inaugural Chinese event was sixth quickest at the end of the day with team-mate Michael Schumacher in fourteenth spot. In the morning the pair had been second and fifth. “There’s no real reason for our performance to have improved, but I would say we are looking quite competitive here, maybe like Brazil rather than Japan,” said Michael.

McLaren-Mercedes third driver, Pedro de la Rosa was quickest in both sessions, followed at the end of the day by Toyota’s Ricardo Zonta. The first “real” racer was Kimi Raikkonen, the McLaren man ahead of new world champion, Fernando Alonso in the Renault. Next came the final McLaren of Juan Pablo Montoya ahead of Barrichello.



Both Ferrari men did far more laps than usual for a Friday. The simple reason for this is that this is the first race for a new engine for both F2005 cars and of course, there is no second race as the season ends here. In fact, it ends here for the engines in more ways than one, as next year’s championship sees the start of a new era with engine capacity reduced from 3 to 2.4 litres and the number of cylinders dropping from ten to eight.

A whole series of farewells gets underway in the paddock this evening, as Peter Sauber says goodbye before his team gets taken over by BMW for next season. Tomorrow, the Jordan team officially marks the changing of its name to Midland for the 2006 season and Pierre Dupasquier, legendary head of Michelin competition department hangs up his pressure gauge and heads off for retirement. Saturday also sees the entire paddock invited to a Minardi barbecue as the third oldest team in the pit lane moves into the hands of Red Bull next year.