McLaren retain first day fastest times Despite the fact that Mika Hakkinen did not improve upon his morning time , he still retained the fastest time of the day at the end of the second free practice session, the Finn not bothering to run a new set of tyres and go for a faster time. David Coulthard's session ended after 28 minutes when he crashed at the exit of the esses. "I got a wheel on the kerb and didn't have enough room to correct it," said Coulthard , who slammed into the tyre barriers sideways damaging the left side of the car and bodywork. The team can repair it for tomorrow. He still kept his second fastest time of the day with his morning time. Schumacher holds third spot Like the McLaren drivers, Michael Schumacher preferred to work on the set up of his car with the same set of tyres than fit fresh rubber and try and improve his morning time which still kept him in third place for the day." We improved the car quite a bit by the end of the session, but not the time because of the old tyres," said Schumacher. Irvine also worked on improving the balance with a heavy fuel load and ended up in 10th place. "Don't worry about Irvine, tomorrow is another day," said Schumacher after the session. Both race cars will run the improved 048C engines tomorrow. Barrichello jumps into fourth fastest for Stewart Rubens Barrichello decided to fit fresh rubber and go for a quick lap in the afternoon, his best time putting him fourth fastest. Johnny Herbert was well back in 20th place, but not too worried as he didn't run fresh tyres. "I have never seen Suzuka so slippery," remarked Herbert, speculation being that new gravel traps added to the track had left a lot of dust on the track. Zanardi improves Like Barrichello, Zanardi drove a quick lap on fresh tyres to take fifth fastest time of the session for Williams, his team- mate Ralf Schumacher preferring to save his tyres and work on different set-ups which saw him back in 11th spot. Panis steps up for Prost A new set of tyres to replace what he thought had been a bad first set saw Panis make a big improvement in his lap time and his car's handling. Trulli stayed with his old tyres, still complaining of too much oversteer after setting 19th fastest time. Villeneuve on the pace After losing time in the morning because of a leaking oil pipe, Jacques Villeneuve had a good run in the afternoon to set the eighth fastest time of the session, his BAR team-mate Zonta also feeling happier in the afternoon after setting 17th time of the day.
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